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A GOLDEN WAY 



NOTES AND IMPRESSIONS ON A JOURNEY THROUGH 
IRELAND, SCOTLAND AND ENGLAND 



J?>3 



BY \ 

ALBERT LeROY BARTLETT 



THE 

Hbbey press 

PUBLISHERS 

114 

FIFTtr AVENUE 

Xon&on NEW YORK /iRontreal 



TME LIBRARY 0F 

COi^GSESS, 
Two Copibe RECEivEe 

FEB. ilO 1902 

CPf^RIOHT 6NTBV 

CLASS Ct^ XXo. No. 

COPY a 



Copyright, igoi, 

by 

THE 

BbbCB iPress. 






'^ 






^ 

> 



TO THE MEMORY 
OF 

/iDp Brotber 

MY COMPANION IN THE ENCHANTED DAYS 
ALONG , 

A GOLDEN WAY. 



PREFACE. 

/ had long- dreamed' the old, old dream — tJiat some 
day my feet should be shod with winged samials, my 
hand should clasp the traveler s staff, the pilgrim's 
scrip should hang from my shoulders, and my eyes 
see the hedged lanes, the cots and the castles, of thai 
older world where history clothes each inch of country 
as the ivy its ivalls, and ivhere literature lias given 
to each rood of earth an individual cJiarm. And 
when the dream becajnc true — and then became like 
a dream again- — / called the route over which I had 
passed A Go\L\c\\^M;xy. A Golden Way ? Ah, well, 
it has been trodden by many pilgrims, and perchance 
what seems gold to me is merely t/ie sun shini)ig on the 
dust raised by their feet. 



CONTENTS. 



I. ERIN FROM QUEENSTOWN TO BLARNEY CAS- 7 

TLE , 

Flower-decked and legend-haunted land. 

II. BANTRY BAY TO LARNE : WITH A BRIEF OF 

IRISH HISTORY 38 

. Erin ! the tear and the smile in thine eyes 
Blend like the rainbow that hangs in thy skies. 

III. AULD AYR TO EDINBURGH 61 

O Caledonia, stern and wild, 

Meet nurse for a poetic child, 

Land of brown heath and shaggy wood. 

IV. ROSLIN AND HAWTHORNDEN : MELROSE : THE 

ENGLISH LAKE REGION ; 79 

Wild round the gates the dusky wall-flowers creep ; — 
— Gone is the bower, the grot a ruined heap. 
Where bays and ivy o'er the fragments spx'ead. 

V. IN AND OUT OF LONDON 106 

— London, the buskined stage 
of history, the archive of the past, — 
The heart, the centi-e of the living world ! 

VI. THE DEVON LAND : ENVOY ". 129 

Dear, strengthful land, formed for wild deeds of might, 
Upon thy somber ways there falls a light, 

A glory born not of the sun and moon ; 
By fancy's spell uprose in this stern place 
The fairest daughter of thy rugged race, — 
Sweet I:4»rna Doone. 



ILLUSTRATIONS. 



VACINr, PAGE 

A Devonshire Lane i'lonlispicce 

By the I larbor, Yoiighal 14 

A Row of Cottages in Youghal 16 

Mausoleum of the Karl of Cork 18 

The Sir Walter Raleigh ITouse 20 

The Blackwater, from I .ismore Castle 22 

The Cottage of Two Counties ■ 24 

A National School 26 

Lismore Castle " 28 

The Old Cathedral of I ,ismore . i 30 

The Fagot- Bearers ■ .> 32 



The Rells-of-Shandon C'hurch. 



34 



lilarney Castles 36 

ClcngarilT Hay." 38 

Cromwell's Bridge 40 

The Upper Lake, Killarney 42 

The Old Weir Bridge 44 

Innisfallen . . -. -^ 48 

Meadow and Winding Stream c6 

The Burns Cottage, Alloway 62 

Allowjly Kirk 64 

Bonnie Dooii, and its ( )1(1 Bridge '. . . . 66 

The Castle of lulinburgh . . ; 72 

I lolyroodvPalace . , 76 

Jenny CJeddes' Stool 78 

An Old Close in Kdinhurgji 78 

Rosslyn Chapel 80 

The 'Prentice's Pillar 82 

Ruins of Rosslyn Castle 84 

Hawthornden 86 

.' ' 5 



6 Illustrations. 

FACING PAGK 

Ruins of Melrose Abbey. 92 

Derwentwater 98 

Where Wordsworth Sleeps 100 

Dove Cottage 102 

Ryclal Mount 104 

Old St. Giles' Church 105 

Shakespeare's Birthplace 106 

The Flower Garden 108 

Anne Ilathaway's Cottage no 

Towards Clopton Bridge 112 

The Shining Avon 114 

The Country Churchyard 116 

The Mausoleum of Thomas Gray 118 

St. Paul's Cathedral .... 120 

Stopham Church 122 

Stopham House 124 

The Manor I louse 126 

The Shadow Bridge 1 28 

Old Ship Inn, Porlock 130 

Culbone Church 132 

Oare Church 134 

Watersmeet 136 

The Lych-gate at Brandon Cluuch . 1 38 

The Moorland 1 40 

The North Cliff Walk . 142 

The Valley of Rocks 144 

A Glimpse of Lynton Hill 146 

The Countisbury Foreland 148 

The Capstone 15.0 

Up-a-long, Clovelly 152 

Down-along, Clovelly 1 54 

The Hobby Drive 1 56 

Funicular Railway at Lynton 1 58 

" Au Revoir " to Clovelly 160 



A GOLDEN WAY. 



I. 

ERIN FROM QUEENSTOWN TO BLARNEY CASTLE. 

Flower-Decked and Legend- 1 Taunted Land. 

• They who go down to the sea in ships, in transit 
to far-off lands, frequently find the way thereover 
no golden one, but a very via dolorosa to be held 
thereafter in mystery and silence. But to him who 
loves the sea and its wildness, to whom the sparkle 
of its waves is full of poetry and gladness, and its 
mighty uptossingsand gloom but the visible signs of 
grandeur and power, \.\\q. golden zvay is entered when 
the little tugs first draw the hawsers taut and begin 
their convoy of the great sea swan through the wind- 
ing channel of the harbor to the ocean beyond. 

There was never a sweeter April day in New Eng- 
land than that Saturday on which, far away, Dewey 
took Manila. The air was like ethereal balm, the sky 
a sea of softest blue wherein floated filmy white 
clouds. The tender young emerald leafage softened 
the outlines of the brown tree branches, and the 
golden sunlight fell on the fresh new verdure of the 
fields an'd bSnks. The social life was athrill with pa- 

7 



8 A Golden Way. 

triotism and excitement, and anxious friends said, 

" Uarc you go? What if the Spanish ?" The 

network of torpedoes had just been placed in Boston 
harbor to send to a speedy and a higher reckoning any 
craft of the Dons that should have hostile designs on 
the Hub. The hour of sailing came. The Canada at 
its wharf had received its charge of passengers, the 
cry, "All 'shore that's goin' 'shore," had separated 
the travelers from the home friends, the gang-plank 
had been drawn in. Then there went fluttering to 
the peak the stars and stripes, and amid shouts and 
wavings from the myriad friends on shore and the 
little band on board, the huge white ocean bird 
began her passage. At nightfall Boston light was 
reached and the gleam of the setting sun lay — a 
golden line — along the course that we had come. 
Before us now was the gray sea, the night, the 
morrow, — and to the chanty of the sailors scrubbing 
down the decks we passed into the court of sleep 
beyond which lay the to-morrow. 

It was through, the murkiness of the earliest hours 
of the morning, seven days later, that the little 
tender took us from the steamer outside, by the 
ways of the channel, past the islands that stand 
sentinel, through the harbor and to the dock of 
Oueenstown. The sea had severely buffeted us, 
the mists had enshrouded us, the fog-horn had mad- 
dened us, the courtesy and attention of all of the 
ship's crew had comforted us, — and withal the sea, 
even in its sullen mood, had charmed us. The trepi- 



From Ouecnstown to Blarney Castle. 9 

datioM of entering a new land, all unfamiliar, was 
upon us as we went through the courteous formali- 
ties of the custom-house, past the military sprig, 
who asked us, "What is your name, sir? Where 
are you going, sir?" and out into the streets of a 
foreign city. The sleepy porter of the Queen's 
Hotel opened the. door deferentially at our ring, 
and gave us a room in which the queen herself might 
have slept,' so large was it, so exquisitely furnished, 
so stately with its canopied beds, so bright with 
mirrors which multiplied glimpses of two worn and 
sleepy foreigners. Outside it was growing light, 
the birds were singing sweetly, and the air blown 
soft from the flower-garden behind the hotel, was 
odorous also with the freshness of the spring morn. 

We had hardly fallen under the for^etfulness of 
sleep, when we were roused by the booming of 
guns.. Were we pursued ? Was some Spanish ship 
seeking our Yankee bodies ? we wondered as we 
came from the land of dreams. It was only 
the saluting guns in the harbor, however, greeting 
the entrance of some German warships, among them 
the Black Prince and the Friedrich Wilhelm. 

Down-stairs the landlady, neatly dressed in black, 
and wearing a white cap, welcomed us from behind 
a little aperture that was like the ticket of^ce in an 
American theater, the waiter bowed most solemnly 
and escorted us to the^coffee-room, and there, sitting 
by a front window, we enjoyed the cleanh'ncss, the 
quiet, the dch'ciousness of the simple breakfast — 
coffee, rolls, ham and eggs, — and the morning papers. 



10 A Golden Wa}^ 

In front was the street, its every detail seeming so 
novel to us, and beyond the bay, all alive with ships 
and boats, and over its waters floated the spirited 
music of a band on one of the warships. 

As I took my first draught of morning air at the 
outside door, a jaunting car was driven swiftly up, 
and the driver greeted me. " Will ye be takin' a 
ride, sir? Me name is Fitz-Harris, and I'm your 
only countryman in the place, sir." These Irish 
tongues are so smooth, and honied, and winning ! 
So, later, in Killarney, a native of the soil, stretched 
out his palm, — an itching palm, I fear, — and cried, 
" Welcome home to ould Ireland, sir ! " while a dear 
old woman, wishing to say the most pleasant thing, 
exclaimed, " Indade, is it possible ye were born in 
Ameriky ! An' the little brogue that ye have, too ! " 
Fitz-Harris, however, had to seek other countrymen. 
With an invigorating morning air, a smiling sky, and 
a pair of stout legs that had rebelled at the " cabined, 
cribbed, confined " deck space of the ship, it would 
have been a physical sin to do anything but walk. 
So up a steep hill, and along the country road to- 
wards Cork, we strolled. Flowers grew everywhere. 
Daisies — sweet miniatures of our own, but crimson- 
tipped — studded the emerald turf^ great fragrant 
violets leaned forth on slender stems, a running 
blue flower, the vetch, and on the walls the toad- 
flax, smiled in the sun, while the stiff wall flowers, 
glorious in many hues, perfumed the air from hun- 
dreds of sheltered places. Hedges of yellow furze 
criss-crossed the country in every direction, and 



From Queenstown to Blarney Castle, ii 

made golden boundaries between neighboring gar- 
dens or fields, while straggling clumps covered with 
the abundance of its common gold the ledges and 
ragged spots in the landscape. Donkey carts driven 
often by old women or Ijarefooted boys or girls met 
us continually, the patient little beasts remonstrat- 
ing with a sort of hopeless grunt against the con- 
stant beating on their tough sides. 

Away tip on a hill we met a little lad, strolling 
idly nowhere and doing nothing, a very little fellow, 
who acknowledged our advent by a dab at his ragged 
cap. I talked with him a little, and, remembering 
how fond American boys are of curios, I drew an 
American cent from my coin purse and gave it to 
him. It was a very bright cent. The features of the 
Indian upon it shone out most clearly, and every 
feather in his head-dress appealed to the beholder. 
An American boy would have placed such a foreign 
coin among his choicest treasures. No ordinary 
purchasing power would have drawn it from him. 
It would have rested in that pocket where there was 
the least danger of moth or ryst corrupting it, and 
it would have been drawn forth with an air of lordly 
ownership to be exhibited to subdued and awed com- 
panions.' The Irish lad seemed more thrifty. My 
little friend" looked at the cent, at the bright Indian, 
and then at me. " An' if ye plaze, sir," said he 
naively, "would ye kindly change it for a pinny?" 

Coming from this country way back into the town 
streets, we found the places filled with the bustle of 
life. Old Irish women, with bared or shawl-covered 



12 A Golden Wa}^ 

heads, and with skirts that stopped far above their 
heavy-shod feet, went artlessly along the crowded 
ways, knitting, carrying vegetables, occasionally 
smoking pipes, and often stopping to gossip with 
acquaintances. There was a confusion of teams in 
the streets, a crowd of loafers on the wharves. 
Along the steep walls of the fortifications the flowers 
hung their peaceful faces, the harbor was undisturbed 
in its serenity by the double-headed eagles of the 
Kaiser's navy, the well set forms of the marines 
carried only delight to the lookers-on, — and so, smil- 
ing, flower-clad, sun-kissed, its great ramparts but a 
sleeping lion, its quaint characters living but to 
add picturesqueness, Queenstown is pictured in my 
memory. 

The goMen zvay led from Queenstown to the place 
of tlie yeiv-tree, Youghal, at the mouth of the Black- 
water — the Rhine of Ireland. On the ride thither 
I realized that on an Irish train a man may carry 
almost anything but a house, for into the compart- 
ment where we were there came a pleasant Irish 
doctor, bringing a trunk, three traveling bags of dif- 
ferent sizes, a bath-tub, a bundle of canes and um- 
brellas, and numerous smaller packages. They filled 
the package racks, the unoccupied seats, and a part 
of the floor, yet nobody seemed to think it at all ex- 
traordinary, and later experiences convinced me that 
such an accompaniment of personal baggage was not 
unusual. The train sped smoothly along through 
beautiful scenery — meadows where cattle stood in 



From Oueenstown to Blarney Castle. 13 

fresh green pasturage, knee-deep, small farms where 
every foot of land was made to yield its tribute of 
vegetables, little thatched cottages, looking as old 
as the hills themselves, aiul everywhere the abundant 
yellow of the blossoming furze. In the station at 
Youghala chorus of rich Irish voices offered us each 
his jaunting car — the universal cab of Ireland. We 
took the oi;e belonging to the Green Park Hotel, and 
rode for three-fourths of a mile along a winding 
and picturesque road, on one side the bay, the harbor, 
the mouth of the Blackwater River, on the other the 
steeply rising side of Knockvarry Hill, with villas 
irregularly dotting its sides. The houses close abut- 
ting on the street,, and the high walls, formed a pro- 
tection to the (gardens that lay behind them. 
Through a gateway in such a high wall we entered a 
courtyard, bright with flowers, the yard of our inn. 
The baggage was taken by the " boots," a bell was 
struck, and behind the desk the landlady immediately 
appeared, s[)ruce, modest, and dignified, like her pro- 
totype of the Queen's Hotel. P^rom the windows 
of the pleasant room to which we were assigned, the 
view swept the harbor, the road, and the high hill. 
Down the street could be .seen the sisters of the 
Loretto, busied with the care of the school which 
they keep. Opposite were the buildings and the 
grounds of the nuns of the order of the Visitation. 
White-coifed and black-robed, the sisters wandered 
solemnly along the walks within the grounds. A 
signal, — and suddenly the walks are left alone ; 
swiftly and silently the nuns have turned to the con- 



14 A Golden Way. 

vent door. In the high yew trees are numberless 
rooks and jackdaws who croak and caw incessantly. 
They build shapeless nests as large as a half-bushel, 
and on the neighborhood plan, for I counted twenty- 
three such abodes in the branches of a single tree. 

On the harbor wall there is a little tower, its top 
reached by a few steps on the outside. I watched 
with some curiosity and much interest a sailor-clad 
man with a long spy-glass, who climbed this tower 
every few minutes, swept the horizon with his glass, 
made some strange signals, and then descended. 
He seemed like a character from some nautical opera 
boufTe, — this lone sailor-man, watching the most 
peaceful and undisturbed of river mouths so vigi- 
lantly, and making signals to some unseen compan- 
ion. He was merely a member of the coast guard, 
on watch to see that no unauthorized person in a 
piratical dory hauled a salmon from the river. 

The chief way of Youghal is a long, long. street, 
the houses continuous on it, running parallel with 
the river. Shops, cottages, and the ruins of house 
walls line both sides of it, while midway of its length, 
and straight across it, stands the old clock tower, 
bearing the arms of the city. In the archway be- 
neath it I read a sign warning people not to carry 
away the paving and flagstones .of the public way. 
I am sure that no one who could lift the stones that I 
saw could be called light-fingered. This old clock 
tower has been in its day a gate of the city, its prison, 
and its execution ground, and there is a story that 
from the little barred windows that look down upon 



From Queenstown to Blarney Castle. 15 

the street five men were hung in a single day. Up 
from this long main street lanes lined with poor, 
half-ruined cottages climb the sides of the hill, and 
across these, but withoAit order, go intersecting 
lanes, — the whole forming in its irregularity a fasci- 
nating labyrinth for the stranger. 

Donkey carts are'everywhere, and the loads that 
they carry ^ire as diverse as the imagination can sug- 
gest, or as the variety of picturesque characters who 
drive them — which is greater than the imagination 
could suggest. The reins by which the donkey is 
driven are always ropes ; his harness is a thing of 
shreds and patches ; frequently the blinders are such 
in very truth — closing over his eyes or pinching into 
them in a way that is uncoi^ifortable to the sensitive 
beholder and even more so to the donkey. To me 
this little beast exemplifies the Christian virtues of 
meekness, long-suffering, and patience. His stout, 
ragged little body goes whither the ropes direct him, 
and stands where it is stayed. Nothing is too bad 
to be fed to him, and no place too evil for his stable. 
To the family — of which he is frequently the most 
useful member — he costs nothing, and he is worth 
a great deal. I rubbed the nose of one that was 
standing in t.he street, a specimen of ragged dejec- 
tion, and he actually brightened and laid his head 
over against me like an affectionate dog. 

In all Ireland later fsaw no such variety of quaint 
old Irish women as in Youghal. Their caps, little 
shoulder-capes or shawls, short skirts — frequently of 
many patches and colors — their cjuick speech, sharp 



i6 



A Golden Wav 



or honied as the nuuul niii;ht be, were of unfailiuLi' 
interest. One of these women was showing; some 
ruin to a gentleman, one da}-, and dihitiny; upon its 
great age. 

"All."' said the gentleman, (lui/./.ieally. " and how 
old was it in the limr of Adam?" 

" Sluite, it's not mesrlf that ean trll \a'." was her 
swift re[)l)-, " hut Adam askinl tlu- same ([ueslion 
whin he w as lui c-." 

IntiMhe \mii1 hrfoie oui" hotrl there eame one 
morning two tlsh-w (mun. tlu'ir di\'ss the i-xtreme of 
the fashion that 1 have described, but matle l>ril- 
liant by shawls of gleaming red. They bore great 
baskets of lu'a\\- fish upon their aims. These they 
spreatl upon tlu- grass for 1 In- inspi-etion of theeoolc. 
It was after the haggliiig ami the eomphtioii o{ the 
bargain that tlu'\- espied the strangers in [\\c chntr. 
Such smiles as wiinkleil their \ isages— eotpietr)- in 
its senility ! 

"Ah," said one, "ah, the haiulsiuue gintlemin — 
the fine, giui'roiis gintlemin! May ye have a good 
jouriu'w and ma\- the saints prosper \-e ! anil, sure, 
sir, ye will gi\e me the price of a sehmoke. for di\il 
a bit o' baee\- he\' 1 bed this da_\-, sir,— blessed be- 
cause me e\as lu"v sten \dui' giner()us faces." 

Along till- old street of \'oughal, climbing one of 
its steep lanes, and following one of tlu- traverse 
wa\'s, we came one d.iy to the old ehuieh of St. 
Mary, dating from the thiiteenlh eentur)- when 
^'oughal was a place of great importance ami in- 
corporating within itsi'lf a Danish church two cen- 



From Ouccnstown to Blarney Castle. 17 

turies older. The symbols in the jambs in the side 
of tlie nave show the builders to have been those 
wandering;" craftsmen who journeyed from place to 
place and lived in rudt^ lutts while they builded, 
whose secrets and symbols are still held in the order 
of which they were the founders — the Free Masons. 
The intelligent woman who was our guide tlirough 
this old cljurch and its grounds, and who wiped a 
tear from her eye as she spoke of her son in America 
— " so kind to his poor old mother," — called our at- 
tention to a grave, a -spot of bald earth where all 
else was clothed with verdure. It hides the dust of 
one wlibse word was notoriously false, but who 
swore by his statements the oath, " If this be not 
true, may the grass never grow above my grave." 
And from the day when his- body was hid in the 
earth the soil above it has lain hard and bare — " the 
grave on which the grass never grows." There are 
two interesting tombs in the south transept — one, 
that of the founders of the chapel, Richard Bennett 
and his wife, Ellis Barry, and another, that of the 
great Earl of Cork, whose family made this their 
mortuary chamber. 

The great Earl lies recumbent in full knight's 
armor. At his feet is the image of hi« first wife, 
Joan, ki"uecling, while at his head is that of his second 
wife, Katherine. Along the edge of the plinth, but 
unseen in the picture, are nine small figures, his 
children. One little figure in a recumbent position 
represents a child who was drowned in the well of the 
neighboring college. As one looks at the image of 



i8 



A Golden Wav 



thisokl Lord ImivIc, who bore honoral)ly an illustri- 
ous name, there comes to his niiiicl the lines ot Cole- 
ridge : 

" rill,' l\nii;ht"s l)oiU'S aie dust, 
And liis jiood sword rust ; 
Ills soul is with tiu' siiiiits, I trust." 

Next to this church and close by the old walls 
of the town is the ancient manor lujusc, built after 
the fashion of his nati\e l)e\on, where Sir \\' alter 
Raleis^h lived in 15S8 8q. Raleigh with the pcu-t 
SpenscM', had foll(n\eil Lord (iia\' when he came to 
Irehnul to suixlue the powerful Desmoml, and was 
i^ranted Iarp;e estates aloni;- the IMackwater. Under 
the yew-trees still standing- in front of the house, 
Spenser conceived I'lic luurir Ouccii, and Sir Walter 
sent forth to poisc^n the pure air the first puffs of 
tobacco smoke. The scrx-ant, it will be remembered, 
thinkini;- him afire, drenched him w ith a bucket of 
water. If oid\' slu> had tlrowned the habit ! ' In the 
garden of the lunise the first potatoes in Ireland were 
plantetl. 

One tlwells for a moment upcm the s\vift-f(^llowing 
fame and disgrace and ui-glect, the abundance and 
the want, and the final \Hrdict of posterit\- uj)on 
these li\es. Spenser dii-i,! in miserx' and woe in 
London, " starved for lack- of a bit of bread," and his 
monument is among the immortals in Westminster 
Abbey. Raleigh was beheaded, but liow courteous 
and loyal, how fair and excellent, history paints 
him ! 

The town was full of the military, and the drawing- 




MAUSOLEUM OF THE EARL OF CORK Page IH 



From QiRciistou'ii to I jhinicy Castle. 19 

room ol ihc (irccn Taik- inn was tlic scene of innch 
1)1 i_L',litness and [)leasant eonversation. Sif llenry 
Jilakc, with Lady iilai<e, was slaying lliere while 
sn))ei"intrndin_L; the re[)aiiin<j^'of the Raleij^h J louse, 
which is his property; Lady Cach)L;an, the wife of 
the Loid I .iciilciiant of Lxland, divinely tall and of 
that type of liish hcaiily which is fair with deep-si:t 
eyes — so akin to (he Swedish l\'pe, came and went 
there; and hriiliant yonni; officers of the Irish RoyHJ 
chatted in a way that deli^dited rny American ears. 
" Arc you really ^oin^^ to believe in iMij^land's friend- 
ship for the Uiiiled States?" said one of them, 
jileasantly ; " I assure you that we all desire you to." 
And when I said, " llow can we doul)t it after your 
cordial assuianccs," his hand was (piickly out- 
stretched to meet mine — an alliance of" two atoms 
of the threat nations. Then the conversation turned 
to literature, ■ and the)' displayed a knowleil^e of 
American literature so critical and so broad that I 
was both j;lad and proud. It is a pleasant tiling- when 
M.lrs and Minerva join streng.th anil breadth of 
thoui;ht. 

I''rom ^^)UL;hal we rode in a jauntin<^ car fifteen 
miles to a little town .that seemed to me an Jrisli 
Thrums. The road led through valleys where little 
livers ran'between ^reen aiul fertile banks, and over 
bleak hills where the wind blew sharp and continu- 
ous. The yellow line of the blossoming furze 
bounded the way. The pale primose and the deep- 
hued violet covered the banks. l^\-ir, vaj^nc, and dim, 
the shapes of'the Knock-ine-all-down mountains ap- 



20 - A Golden A\'ay. 

pearcd on the lioiizon. Ami wiicn wo had conic 
down a steep and w inthni;- road into this viUage, the 
heavens opened and the Hoods fell, h'or comfort 
and dryness we asked that a fire be built ii'i (.)iir room, 
but the servant reai)[)eared after some time and said 
the mai^pies had filled up the chimne\- with sticks 
and stuff, antl that it could not be cK'aned out at 
once. The magpies in tlu: chimnc}- were earl}- risers, 
and with the first f;"iiut flushings of the mornins; li_L;ht 
— and these came ver_\' early — they llounderetl noisily 
in their quarters. Then they i)erched (mi the 
branches of the trees just t)utside the w iudow antl 
sans;' a very disas^reeable pican to the rising- sun. 

The main street of the town — at once street and 
sitlewalk — is long" and n.urow, w ilh houses l)ordering 
it in contiguit}', with loafing and skulking figures at 
the doorwa\'s and abi^ut the corners, and groups of 
great overgrown boys leaning with crossed legs 
against the sides of the thatched cottages. The 
claye}- soil, moistenetl by the rain, clung to what- 
e\er it touched. The too-pre\'alent drinking-place 
had set its seal on the faces of both men and women. 
The complaint of poverty was on ex'ery lip. The 
country was beautiful ; the ground fertile; but i>ov- 
erty reigned, and the causes of it were so closel}' 
under their eyes that they cpiit'e o\-erlookeci them. 

It was on the ride to this little town, and in my 
walks about it, that 1 reali/.eil the nearness of the 
pig to the peasant. Little whitewashed cottages, 
with clambering roses and blossoming wall flowers, 
the pig in the front }ard or looking from the front 



From Ouccnstovvn to Blarney Castle. 21 

door, rciniiuk'd nic that it is perhaps the Irishman's 
sense of justice that gives the freedom of the cot to 
the beast that pays the rent. " Wliy do you call 
them lucky pigs? " I asked of a dealer in bog-oak 
curios as I took up a, Httle carved watch-cliarm. 
" In faith, sir," he rei>lied, " the pig is the gintlemin 
that pays the rint, and them is lucky as have him." 
Tile presence of the " gintlerhin that pays the rint,' 
is quite evident to the sense of smell. There is a 
story of an Irish gentleman who had great affection 
for the pig, and great -interest in a certain style of 
architecture. So he built a piggery in Eastern style 
of architecture, and when it was finished called a 
neighbor to see it.. 

" Isn't that a fine pagoda on the building, Pat," 
said he. 

" Indade," said Fat, " I'm a thinkin' the finer pig- 
odor is under the buildin'." 

Along the Lismore road I wandered one after- 
noon, gathering the flowers that grew here and there, 
and seeking the shamrock which is so elusive even 
in Ireland. A little urchin, barefooted, ragged, but 
bright-eyed and attractive, walked with me. 

" Do yQ,u kno\Y the shamrock ?" I asked him. 

"Indade I. do, sir," he replied. . 

" Well, jf you will fintl me a piece," said I, " I 
will give you a penny." 

His quick eyes searched the ground, the turf- 
grown wall, the neighboring field, but unsuccessfully. 
Then he said, " I know it on the altar on St. 
Patrick's day. sir, but it's not out of doors that I 



22 A Golden Way. 

can tell it." I soon found a piece and showed it to 
him, telling him how to recognize it by its small 
leaf, its dark color, its smooth surface. He walked 
on with me, chattering about the flowers on the 
way, and picking such blossoms as he thought I 
might value. There was one orchid-like flower that 
grew at the bottcMn of a bank. He stepped gently 
down the declivity and pressed his dirty, freckled 
face close to it. " It do smell so swate," he remarked, 
but he did not pick it for me. I reached down 
to pick it myself, but his quick hand stopped me. 
'* Don't do it, sir," said he ; " it he's the dead man's 
flower, and it be's not right to pluck it. Ye'U meet 
the funeral of a fricntl, sir. if \-e pick it." 

Well, friends are not so numerous that I can risk 
meeting the funeral of one, and so I yielded to his 
superstitious \\ish. 1 left the little lad at the door 
of his poor cottage where the pig was looking be- 
tween the palings, and the mother was hoeing the 
garden. I had walked nearly a mile beyontl when 
I heard some one puffing in hot haste behind me. 
I turned and found my little friend bringing me a 
gift. He had dug from his garden two primroses, 
one of tlie palest yellow, the other of the most del- 
icate pink, each abounding in blossoms, and he had 
run to place them, all wet and. muddy, in my hands. 
Such courtesy, such thoughtfulness, such kindliness 
of heart, washed all the dirt from his honest face, 
hid every rag of his clothing, and covered his naked 
feet, for I saw only a little Irish gentleman, — and I 
wished devoutly that the finer clothes of some of 



From Ouccnstown lo lilann.-y Custlc. 23 

our American lads coveted boys of as gentle manners 
and as much true woitli. 

One day 1 walked alont; a country way until I 
came to a little cottagC whose neatness drew my 
attention. So white was the wall, so luxuriant the 
rose-bush thai nearly concealed it, so clean swept 
the walk, that I wished to "sketch " it, as the Irish 
say. Just as 1 was arranging my camera, there came 
a soft passing shower that drove me to ask admit- 
tance at the door. There responded to my knock 
an old, old woman, specklessly'clean from the white 
crown of her ca[) to the hem of her short skiit. 

"An' .shure ye'r wilcome, ■ sir," she saitl, "an' 
I rivtn knows 1 wish it were more worthy of ye." 

It was a very old cottage, lighted by two little 
windows, each scarcely a foot square, with little 
white curtains tied above them, and a pot of blos- 
somiivg flowers on the sill. The floor was but the 
naked earth.. The furnishings were her bed, a little 
shrine at its head, a dresser with a few plates care- 
fully arranged, ami a single stool on which she had 
been seated," trying to blow eimugh life into the 
fagots in the fireplace to heat the tiny black" kettle 
that hung from the crane above. There were evi- 
dences of loneliness and most stringent poverty. 

"And have you no children?" I asked. 

" I'm not knowin', sir," was her answer ; " I tried 
to give my children g£)od schoolin', an' I thinks I 
was mebbe toci kind, !)ut tiny left me an' wint to 
Amerik)', sir, an' it's siventeen years since I had the 
last word from thim." 



24 A Golden Way. 

I could not believe that this sweet and lovable old 
mother had been forgotten by her own. It is not in 
the nature of the Irisli to forget, but j^crhaps the 
drink habit, too easily acquired in these Irish vil- 
lages, has woven its meshes about the sons whom 
she, alone in her cabin, mourns. 

She blessed me as I loft her in her gateway, and 
added, "If ye name the picter, sir, ye may say it 
is the cabin of two counties," — for the dividing line 
between the counties of Cork antl W'aterfonl runs 
through it. 

One da}- I knocked at the door of the pretty 
national schoolhouse on Hog Lane, ami was pleas- 
antly in\'ited to enter. The room was perhaps fort}- 
feet long and t\vent\'-fi\c feet wide, its ceiling being 
the undecoratetl roof. The walls were whitewashed 
and well hung with maps and pictures illustrating 
natural history. The head-master's desk was in one 
corner, and there was a small fireplace near it. The 
boys sat at long deal desks. The room contained 
eighty-four pupils from three years of age to fifteen. 
The assistant was teaching at one side of the room, 
and two of the older boys were attending to other 
classes. Teachers of these national schools are 
divided into four grades, and are paid respectively 
$175, $220, $300, and S350 a year, but success in 
attaining certain results brings additional pa}'ment 
nearly doubling these sums. The government 
furnishes the text-books to the pupils at a trifling 
cost, the primer selling for a cent, and tlie fifth 
reader, the largest and highest of the series, for 



From Oucctistowii to Rhirncy Castle. 25 

twclvi' cents. The schools have eight weeks vaca- 
tion in the year, and any holiday, is to betaken from 
this allowance. 

The room was all tallying aiul studying at once, 
but a clap of the master's hand would still it for a 
minute. Otice in a while the master would say, 
" Mike O'Keefe, be afther doing your business at 
once." " Jim, is that you a-blathering ? And what 
about?" " Indade, Pat, it's too bold ye are." 
Hut with all its seeming crudeness to one accustomed 
to the martinet discii)lii)e of a New England school, 
there was an intelligence among the pupils that 
might have shametl their more methodical American 
contemporaries, (jovernment positions of certain 
grades are filled by competitive examinations, and 
these boys spur themselves to outrank the privately 
educated sons of gentlemen. 

Presently at the door appeared the gentle faces 
of the nuns .who had come to give religious instruc- 
tion, for the school is Catholic, and the priest co-n- 
trols the appointment of its teachers. 

"There's a Protestant school in the village," said 
the master, " but whin the byes git big, they're after 
shying thejr cap at the misthress, if she be young, 
- — and tliin they come here." 

Across the Bride River, a tributary of the Black- 
water, there rises the ruined, ivy-mantled tower of 
Lisfinny Castle. Scpiare and massive, it towers 
eighty feet high — a grim and solemn landmark. 
Against its sides and built from the stones of the 
ruin, are the cattle-sheds of the farmers who hire it. 



26 A Golden Wa3\ 

When we souglit to climb its hei^jht, a tall and lath- 
like lad, acting as our escort, led us first through a 
door that had been cut into the old dungeon, where 
the only prisoner, a sleepy farm horse, \yas standing 
in a deep litter of straw. Up the narrow winding 
stair A\e climbed from this, and half way up a bar- 
rier, built low across the way, made us stoop to go 
farther. In dax's of old doubtless some warrior grim 
stood on the upper side of this barrier to crush the 
skull of any enemy who should seek to pass above 
it. As no one halted us, we stooped and then went 
on. Abo\'e was the main hall, now grass carpeted, 
with a rude firej)lace and narrow windows in the 
thick walls. vVnother climb, and we reached a 
ruined chamber, with niches still existing in the 
walls for the sleeping couches. Then farther to the 
diz/.y top we climl)cd, and here our guide showed 
us the stone shute adown \\hich the dead or the 
condemned coyld be swiftly shot to the bottom. 

Twilight fell while we lingered there; the 
thrushes sang sweetly in the trees, some bats flitted 
forth, and an owl made plaint to the rising moon, 
liut what beating of hearts there must have been in 
these very rooms, when, in tliose times of warring 
clans, the approach of the foe was seen, and men 
with murder in their hearts lay siege. 

It is said that Lisfinny was connected by an 
underground passage with Strancally, a mile away. 
Strancally was a stronghold of the great Desmond, 
and beneath it is a chasm called the Murdering 
Hole. When the owner of this castle hated a man 



From Quccnstown (o I)I;i:iK'y Castle. 27 

deep!)', he assiinicd tlic most friendly inanncr and 
witli^i'cat cordiality invited him to dine at the 
castle. Those who accepted the invitation were 
seen no more, until one man.iged to reach the river, 
and, floating down, told the dreadful tale to the 
I^arl of Ormond. lie immediately marched against 
Strancally and blew it to ruins. 

Not far from Strancally on the Hlackwatcr, the 
ruined keej) of the castle of Templemichael rises, 
about wlK)se last occupant is told the story of the 
home-sick soul. Garret h'itz<jerald, the last Ger- 
aldine of Templemichael, was driven from his castle 
by the iron Cromwell, who left but ruins in its 
place. lie fled to Ardmore, where he had an estate, 
and, dyin<; years later, was .buried in the Old Parish 
cemetery there. But on the ni^ht foLlowini^ his 
burial a voice was heard at Templemichael crying 
from ■ the opposite bank, " Garralth harrowing," — 
the ferry for Garret. Year after ycixv, when at night 
some wanderer lingered by Templemichael, the same 
cry, plaintive and appealing, was heard. And so, 
at last, some young men went^acro.ss the river to 
Ardmore and brought back the body of Garret and 
laid it with those of his fathers at Templemichael. 
And thereafter the voice called no more. » 

The goliien way led next to Lismore, and here 
we found an inn so perfectly clean, so charming 
and simple in its furnishing, its pictures so well 
chosen, that I was not surprised to learn that the 
Duke of ycu'onshire was actually the landlord, and 



jS 



A Cioldcn Wav. 



that the aims — tlncc slai;s' licads suniiountcd by a 
crown — o\cr the door, wliich L;i\c the inn the name 
of " The Devonshire Arms," indicated a supervision 
b)' the ox'erseer of his estate. 

The ij^reat caslle ch)se by the inn is the most 
beautiful in all 1 iilaiul, and its history is that of 
eight hundi'ed ^•ea^s ot w.iri.ire, sie^^e, and chant;'e. 
I know of no landscape \iews suri>assini; those frcnu 
its windows. Once when James the Second was a 
guest at the Castle, he entered for the first time the 
great ili'.iw ing-room, and walked straight across it to 
the bay w indow, but started in surprise at the height 
from whicli he looked down. Standing in this 
window - still called the King J.imes window-one 
sees a \'iew of the winiling Hl.ickwater, its gi'ntie 
inter\-ales, its bortleriiig forests, and llu- mountains 
l)e\'ond, from which he is reluclaiil to turn. 

Outside the garden washlled with beautiful llowers. 
rhotlotIendr(,)ns. of great size ami beauty, heds of 
forget-me-nots and pansies, ckimbering roses, snow- 
white japonicas ; and a wisteria \ine ot maivelous 
size hung w ith great laxishness its la\ ender racemes 
over the gra\" stone w alls. 

As I walked through the duke's grounds.tlie sweet- 
est of birtl-songs greeted my ear. 

" It is a wren," said the stcwvaid. 

" If onl\' 1 might see it ! " exclaimed I. 

And then, as if to gratify me, the smallest mite 
of a bird, a mere hop-o'-my-thumb, perched on 
the swiU'ing topmost bcnigh of a little tree close by, 
and poured out melody lit tor an angel's ear. 



Krniii OiKinslown to HI.iriK'v Castle. 29 

VVIicn Irclaiul was tlu- ccnU-r of ])iity and learn- 
ing, a thousand and nioic years, a^o, Lisniore was 
its intellectual head and its reli^dous heart. The 
fanu: of ils University was so {^ncal ( hat it attracted 
scholars e\ en fiom (ire-c^ce. Itssciiools, attended j)y 
thousand of pupils, weic free, so truly free that 
lodj^in;^ .ind hoard as well as instruction were without 
l)ricr. Devout and learned priests [;ave to its fame 
tlu: odor of ]u)liness, and a part of its Abbey was 
deeiued so sacred that Uo woman was allowc-d to 
enter it. 

With the echo of tin- sweet wrt:n soiu.^ still in my 
cars, and .w'aiul(iiii<^ t hrou(^h the lovely I'jounds that 
once belonged to the Abbe\', I found it easy to 
believe that there dwelt and prayed that monk 
whose stt)ry lives in the folk-Ior.e of the l^Iackwater 
Valley. y\iul this is the lei;end : 

Aj^es a<;o a nu)id': lived in holy and prayerful 
humility, and when his years were fidl he was still 
serving; and praisinj^ (iod loiit inually. Now one 
morning when the Hrst rays of the sun, eiiterin^his 
little window, fell u|)on him bowed in prayer, he; 
heard a bird sin^in<^' so sweetly as only the birds of 
. llc:aven do, aiul he must needs find the bird. So he 
rose from his knees, and went into the <.;arden. 
There, on a swayiuL^ branch of a rose-tree.-, the little- 
bird sanj^ for awhih-, and then it (\v.w to a m(;re 
distant trc-c-. Andhis-,son^ ^lew even sweeter, so 
that the luoid^ followed it. And wheiuver tin- monk 
came near to the bird, he Hew still farther away, but 
his son^ become more and more enchanting. The 



30 



A (ioldiii W^iv. 



Ilowcrs srcmrd Id Mo.ssom nunc w oiuK rl ull\-, loo, 
;uul the air to l)c sulu-i' aiul iiioic I'r.i^ranl llian the 
monk IkhI i\ci known. Sonu't inu-s lu- thonj^ht that 
t he ll<>\\ CI s and t hi- I rcrs w t-n' chanting soil (i/t>ri<is, 
and thai ihr liidit sdcanu'd and shoiu: as he had 
lU'vi'i seen it l)rlon'. IlinsKd on l)\- the- ecstatic 
soni; ol the hnd \\y loHowrd until ni!.dit(alk with no 
fatisMic in his hmhs and with iinspcakakK' pcaccand 
content in liis heart. luil when the nis^hl shadt's 
Icll lie went h.ick to the .\l)hcy, .dl his hcins^- still 
oN'crilow in;^ with id.idncss. Now w lu-n lu- c.nue to 
tin- .\l)l)e\- door a new kicc a|)|ieaifd at the wicket, 
and within all w .is si r.ni;'/'. .uul he km-w none w honi 
hcs.iw. .\nd he ciicd ont, " nrotlu'is. \\ h.il h.is 
happencil since the morn th.it .dl luie is so clian^etl ?" 
'rhc\- answiMiul kiim, "^ Not hini; h.is hap|)eneik ;iiul 
t heie h.i\ e heiMi no ch.int;es. Ihd who.iii' \on who 
w e.ir our ;;. II 1) ,ind \ el .ire nid<nown to lis.''" v\iul 
when he h.id iM\en his ii.inie t he I'ldcst ol" the monks 
s.iid, " This is m.iiA clous i lid i-i'd. lor it is two liiiiidrct.1 
N'eais since the hi other ol \oiir ii.iiiu- lelt these 
walls." .\nd he who h.ul follow ctl the hinl knew 
then th.il ( lod h.id thus hc.uil il iill\' c.illcd him to 
1 limsell. aiul t li.it the lields w herein he h.ul followed 
thcsiMiv, wen- those ol l',l\ siniii. !^o he bowed his 
he. id. and his soul went once.moie Irom the le.ilms 
ol lilc .iiul int(.'ied tlu' ctcin.il abode of t li(> s. lints. 
1 lhoiii;ht of this st<>r\- .is I sal in the clnirclix'.ud 
of the oUl catliedral, founded in the seventh century, 
my seat an oUl, i>ld tomhoxir which the yews bent 
soK-miil\-. The moss .uul i\\- hid the stoiU'S .itoiiiul, 



MiOTT' r ' ' ' < ' 


■IvQI^. 


m 








M' : '..>?';■ • ■ 


vffirl 


m ■■■^■^■■■- " 


,v<JpKJ 




^■^■^ 




'^^^^mi 




t^t 


# r'gflLfM 


■>^ ^n^^iii 


''^■'^w^^Sv^i^^^^SH 


I '"-iwiB 


m. ^:r^ 




^1 


''( '^> 3 


:• JfiH^Mi(0^|^^^R 




■>'sV.> -^l^Hfl^NH 



rVoni Oucciislov'ii lo lilanicN' Castk-. 31 



the tooth of time had gnawed away the rude iu- 
sciiplions that named t lu' (hist of the foiL;t)tteii de.ul, 
and still, (ill, iron)' ! I he for!.Ml-inc-n()is ^rt-w there 
so ihiekl)' thai tlu)' seemed to minor the blue of 
lieaveii. 

Within the ehureh is the oldest eeltit: eross in ex- 
istence, a hit of slon(.' scareely a foot s(|nare its 
reverse i)earin<^f sonu- nn(h'cii)hered insei iplion. 
There, ahio, is a lond) lo sonu- mendxr of tlu- Mus- 
54"ravc- fannl)', t In- sides of whit h aic carved in ic-pie- 
seiitation of the twelve d-iseipies, th.e i(nk that crew, 
the thirty i)ieces of silver, and the trailed)' of Cal- 
vary,, 

- Away up on the mountains, in a l)eanlifully shaded 
road, 1 met a i)arty of faj^ot <^atlu'rers — ])easant 
vvomenof the mountains 'laden with iMi at bundles 
of brush. Tluy looked so unusual that 1 asked 
permission to ph()lo!.;ra|)h them. The)' icadily as- 
sented, and stood i)atient ly beneath their burdens 
while 1 ai"rani;c:d the camera. 

Thesi; mountain peopU; an- said to retain most 
purely the characterist iis of tlu: old Irish jjcople, 
as they use most h.d)ituall)' the old liish lan!.;uai;e. 
'i'lu:\' bantt-red each other with much wit an.d t^ood 
nature, and were very ajfrecuble chance acciuaint- 
ances. They iiupiiritl so closely about the lile and 
occupatioiis of the American women, that 1 was 
really afraid th.it the conveisat ion nn'^hl le.ul uj) to 
the latest fashion in dress sleeves, but luckil)' the 
canu-ra had done its work before that point was 
reached. When the picture had been taken, and I 



32 A Golden Way. 

had given them a trifling coin apiece, they showered 
blessings on my head, and then with the greatest 
interest inquired, " An' plaze, sir, can ye give us the 
latest news of the war?" 

Whenever I think of Cork — a station on the 
golden way — I hear the chiming of the bells of 
St. Ann Sliandon's church -the church of Father 
Proutx-'s song : — 

" With deep affection 
And recollection 
I often think of 

Those Shaiulon liells, 

Whose sounds so wild would, 
In the days of my childhood, 
Fling round my cradle 
Their, magic spells. 

On this I ponder 
Where'er I wander, 
And thus grow fonder 

Sweet Cork of thee— 

With thy bells of Shiindon 
That sound so grand on 
The pleasant waters 
( )f the river lee." 

The Irish jeweler wlio in\itcd me to see a silver 
model of the Shandon Churcli. told with much pride 
that this model was exhihitctl at the World's Kxi)o- 
sition in New Orleans, and that, being shown at a 
reception given by the Secretary of State, the Pres- 
ident of the United States — Mr. Arthur — whose 
grandfather and father were born in Ireland, re- 



From Ouccnstown to l)I:irncy Castle. 33 

j)catc'(l this melodious pocrn of I'al-hcr I'routy. The 
church is situated 011 Shandon hill, ahci<^iit reached 
by ci'ooked streets through a jjoor part of the city. 
Its walls were built in the twelfth century, but its 
interior is comparatively new.' Within is a font with 
this rude inscription, " Walker i^llinton and William 
ring made this pant at their chari^c, 1629." I 
climbed the narrow stone stairs and stood under, and 
attain above, llu; famous bills while they pealed 
sweetly the (piarter hour. In the churchyard, and 
close to the chime tower,- is the tomb of the Mahony 
family, the Rev, I'^rancis Mahony — " Father i'routy " 
— bein;^ recordi'd as dv'iuL; in Au^nist, 1X66. In this 
churchyard is the unusual condition of Catholic and 
IVoteslant lying iii neighboring graves in the God's- 
rood of a Protestant church,- and the bells of one 
faith ring into literature through the p()em of the 
preacher of another creed. I'^ither I'routy, born in 
C"ork in 1 S04, seive-d two vocations, the church and 
journalism. I li; was educated as a priest in Paris, 
but U'ft the priesthood for literature in 1830. Then, 
when the lafer years came, he returned to the holy 
life, and died in a monastery in Paris. 

When the Cork races arc; on, the streets are 
crowded with life in grc-at vaViet}', a good-humored, 
pushing crowd, rich and pool' alike, my lord with his 
grand ecpiipagc: and the peasant in his Inimble don- 
key cart, seeking the same destination- the course. 
The racing park is a very large one, the track around 
it being a mile long. Outside the park gates the 
gandilers and fid'Cers draw the pennies of the un- 
3 



34 



A Golden Wav. 



sophisticated by all manner of devices. Within the 
park and forming" its center, is a gre.it turf\- expanse, 
sepaiated by a narrow slim)- ditcli from the track, 
but free to an}- one, and offeiing an cwcellent place to 
see the horses and the racing. To us it- offered at- 
tractions that the grand stands chd not — oppcMluni- 
ties to see the peo[)le, — old Irish women selling an\-- 
thing from buns to pickled pigs'-feet. peasant ckinc- 
ers chsphiying the steps o( the countrx- break-chtwns, 
women with bare feet antl \()Iul)K' tongues, and 
shambling, hea\'y-faced men. carrying shillelahs, — 
the t}-i)es of llie nuxst extreme stage llibernians. 

Seated by the (h'tch, her feet bare, lier hands grimed, 
her face stained and seamed b\- out-of-door lalior, 
pult'ing a sluMt bhick pipe and chaffing a circle of 
men between puffs, was a young peasant woman, a 
type of her ]iappy-g(~>-lucky class. I ler sallies chew 
my attention, and when she told a story I was one 
of her listeners. It was an old story that she told, 
but lier rich brogue ga\-e it freshness. 

" O, povert}' is a dridful thing," said she, " an' it's 
not any one of ye's that's knowin' howdridfuL l^ut 
thank God for the ginerous hearts that pities and 
relaves the poor. Tliere was a man once as had had 
no fooil lor three (hi\-s, an' to fill his stomacli he was 
atein' the grass by the roadside. y\n' there was a rich 
woman as saw him atein' grass b\' tlie roatlsi(.k\ An' 
she wint out of lier illigant house, straight <mt to the 
l^oor man. An' slie said to him, ' My jioor man, 
why are ye atein' grass? ' An the man said, ' Sluirc 
it's ha\-in' nothin* to ate for three days that I am. an' 




THE BELLS-OF-SHANDON CHUHCH Page 34 



From Queenstown to Blarney Castle. 35 

I am atcin* grass to fill nic stomach,' ' Come wid 
nic,' said the kind woman. Thin she led him into 
her house, an' it was i'lligant with carpets and picters 
an' furnityer. An' she led him straight into the din- 
in'-room, an' there was a table wid iverythin' that 
ye can think of to ate, — mate an' turkeys an' pertaties 
an' fish an' iverythin' all smokin' hot. An' thin the 
kind womii-n opened the door ahind the dinin'-room, 
an' said, ' There, my good man, go out on me lawn 
an' ate grass. It's thicker and higher than in the 
strate.'" 

Seven miles from Cork are the ruins of that famous 
old stronghold of the McCarthy family that holds 
the Blarney stone. 

" There is a stone there , 

That whoever kisses, 
Oh, he never misses 

To grow eloquent ; 
'Tis he may clamber 
To my lady's chamber, 
Or become a Member 

Of Parliament."-^ 

I had thought of this castle only in connection with 
the stone, 'and so the beautiful grounds wherein it 
is set were my first surprise. Then the extent of 
the castle -astonished me, and its round. tower, its 
later tower, and the old passages and ways of the 
place interested me. Here first I realized what a 
dungeon and cells might be in the troublous times 
of old when such towers as this were at once home 
and fortre,ss» Partially made of masonry and par- 



36 A Golden Way. 

tially cut from solid rock amid the foundations of 
the castle were caves in which one could not stand up- 
right, the only entrance for light a narrow slit in walls 
that were from seven to fourteen feet thick, and even 
this narrow slit was doubly and heavily grated. Low 
subterranean passages, winding, dark, led I know 
not where. The guide said one was a quarter of a 
mile long. " Huh," he said, as he found some bits 
of brush on the floor, " the badgers be buildin' here. 
The i)lace is full o' thim,"— and I cared no longer 
to follow the feeble gleam of his candle amid their 
haunts. But in these underground ways were places 
in the solid stone that once were the stocks in which 
the prisoners were chained. The dungeons, the 
caves, and the burrowing ways were places of the 
most dread horror. Surely the nervous organization 
of the men of old was less sensitive than ours, when 
they could endure such living tombs an hour with- 
out madness. 

" Guess the height of the tower," said the guide. 

" Oh, a hundred and twenty feet," said I. 

" The second exact guess within twenty years," 
said the keeper of the Blarney stone, " an' the ither 
gintleman fell the whole hundred feet whin he tried 
to kiss the stone, jist twenty feet from the top. Will 
ye be afther tryin' it, sir ? " 

Now he who wishes to grow eloquent by such os- 
culation, must be hung by the heels from the dizzy 
parapet above, and for me it was well enough to let 
/ dare not wait upon / woitld. 

\\c walked back to Cork by a delightful road 



From Qiieenstown to Blarney Castle. 37 

that led over hills from which were wide and fair 
prospects, by high-wallcd farms, and near pleasant 
pastures where the cattle browsed knee-deep in the 
herba^^e. In these pastures were stones that stood 
alone like monuments, reminding me of these lonely 
memorials of the dead that are seen on old and 
solitary New England farms. My question to a 
faroier brought the answer, *' Thini's the scratchin' 
posts, sir." Lacking stone walls and trees, the 
pastures must have the posts to relieve the itching 
hides of the cattle. , ' 

It was on our way over this road that the ripple 
of a bird melody fell on my ear. My eye followed 
the sound, and, oh, joy ! — I saw the sweet musician 
soaring to the heavens and, gently floating down 
again. It was the lark ! Ano-ther and apother flew 
up as we went along, pouring an unceasing gush of 
rippH-ng music until the bird became a mere dot in 
the'sky and then was lost in the blue ether. And 
still from somewhere beyond our vision the melody 
floated down like an angel's song. Then bird and 
song drew once more nearer earth, falling, falling, 
until the sweet grass was reached. Sometimes I 
have heard a little eaged canary whose song had 
ceased during moulting, begin anew to tuae his'ten- 
der notes^ uttering the sweetest and most gentle 
and artless of melodies. A little stronger than such 
caged bird's song, but strangely akin to it, full of 
love, of liberty, of joy, was to me the song of this 
blithe spirit who " singing ever soars, and soaring, 
ever singeth." 



II. 



BANTRV r.AV TO LARNi; : ^VI^II A I'.RIIlK of IRISH 
11 IS TORY. 

I'.iiii I tlie tear and the smile in lliine eyes 
lilenil like the rainbow that hangs in thy skies. 

The railway ride that lay between Cork and Ban- 
try gave fleeting glimpses of sweet common things, 
quiet farms, browsing catlle and nibbling sheep, 
streams, now swift, now quiet, and sometimes so 
overspread with a white blossuniing water-weed that 
one might have thought a thousand apple-trees had 
snowed their white petals down. At l^antry we 
took a mountain wagon for the ten-mile drive to 
Glengariff. A part of this ride lies along the shores 
of gentle Banfry Bay, across whose hazy waters the 
guarding momitains stand blue and dim. Into Glen- 
gariff — the " rough glen " that seemed to us so pro- 
tective—the gentle west winds come with such soft 
breath, about it the mountains so stretch their ram- 
parts against the attacks of harsher blasts, that semi- 
tropical flowers grow in luxuriance. Countless la- 
burnums in full bloom, the arbutus which gives 
fruit and flower together in October, fuschias which 
grow to tree-like size, great wanton rose-vines, 
white and purple clematis, and everywhere the shin- 
ing green of the holly, make charming foregrounds 
38 



Bantry Bay to Larne. 39 

for the more distant view of the winding, island-stud- 
ded bay, and the encircling hills. 

The flowers and yines adorn everything, and even 
the jail had so clothed its stone walls with their 
beauty, and so formed them into lines and circles 
in its surrounding grounds, that it had become an 
apt illustration of the line, 

" WlTfere every pios]:)cct pleases and only man is vile." 

A romantic, vine-clothed arch in a beautiful valley 
is the ruin of a bridge which is said to have been 
built by Cromwell's men in a single hour. 

From Glengariff tlie mountain wagon took us out 
from the village and up and up, along a road built 
in the side of the mountain, on one hand the tower- 
ing rocks, on the other a dizzy descent., The wind 
smote us through the mountain gaps, but the road 
was' in good condition, the horses sure of foot and 
strong of .body, and the driver careful. Views ex- 
tending miles and miles, with valleys and mountains 
unfolding their constantly changing panorama, were 
before us; the mountains wereTock-strewn and pre- 
cii)itous, and yet wherever a rood of earth appeared, 
smooth,, green, and fertile,, no matter what the 
height or how steep the path thereto, there some 
farmer h^id planted his rude cabin and teased the 
earth to bring forth fruits. 

At the crest of the^iills wedrove into a tunnel like 
the eye of a needle, and when half-way through it 
the driver said, " Gintlemin, ye have passed from the 
Countx' Cork to the County Kerry." Glorious, in- 



/\o A Golden Way. 

deed, was this first view of the County Kerry from 
the crest of Turner's Rock. Wild, bold, and clear, 
the numerous peaks of the Mai^illicuddy Reeks lay 
before us. Valleys roughly carved, and hills care- 
lessly thrown up by the hand of Nature, stretched 
far and far away, and winding back and forth was 
the thread-like line of the road that was to bring us 
to Kenmare. To come from such sublime heights 
into a village where beauty and ugliness were close 
neighbors, and which was engrossed with a pig fair, 
was a descent to the ridiculous. The streets were 
filled with all conditions of life, all sorts of ]iersons 
and wagons and pigs. There was ihc oiuf/ciudm pig 
that had ridden to market in his own cart, and the 
more plebeian parens who had walked in at the end 
of a rope, the other erd o.f wliich his master carried. 
The pigs strongly objected to an}- change of owner- 
ship, and wailed loudly, sharply and constantly, at 
the touch of stranger hands. 

Again our road swept u]i the mountain sides, past 
peat beds, rude gardens, and hoxels from which the 
children started and ran long distances beside the 
coach to catch any penn}- which might be thrown to 
them. Occasionally these children would offer us 
small bunches of the Killarney fern, nn^st delicat-e, 
brown, transparent fronds, for which they must have 
searched long and sharply, so rare are thew 

By and b}' from the height we caught sight of 
silver patches in the gieen valley below, the goal of 
our long journey, the lakes of Killarney. Now the 
road came down to a level stretch, and we rode 



Bantry Bay to Larne. 41 

through scenes of quiet beauty, over miles of roads 
like those of a private park, where great flowering 
rhododendrons leaned over to us and flowers bordered 
the wa}'side, — and then we came to a magnificent 
avenue of trees, the ch)se approach to the viHage. 

The lakes of Killarney, full of light and gladness, 
lie among the mountains as a smile between lips that 
else are somber and stern. They are as rich in ro- 
mance as a lover's heart, as musical wn'th song and 
legend as an old bard's harp. An old poem called 
them the " tenth wonder of Ireland," but no one re- 
members the other nine. Numberless streams rush 
and fall down the mountain' sides to become the 
waters of these enchanting lakes, and the sides of 
the hills clothe themselves with the most luxuriant 
v^erdure to become a setting fit for tjieir beauty. 
Nowhere does the arbutus grow^ so profusely, no- 
where do the. noble elm and ash so mingle their dark 
and light, green drapery as here to enhance the 
luster and light of the lakes. 

The legendary story o{ the origin of these lakes is 
this: Once in the far-off time"" when all such tales 
were true, a noble knight often came here to woo a 
fair maicjcn. And whenever he came she gave him 
to drink a glass of water that sparkle^d like the 
mountain dew, and tasted to his lips like the rarest 
wine. — Such witchery of transformation does love 
work with common -things ! — But when he teased 
her to disclose the fountain whence she drew such 
water, she coj'ly refused, and begged him not to ask. 
For her fairy godmother had given her the power 



42 A Golden Way. 

that if she should touch iier lips unto a certain stone 
in the valley such water shouKl "^ush forth until she 
kissed it again. Now one da)- her lover came wliile 
she was absent at the faii'\- spring;', and not finding 
her within her home went out to seek her. Love 
perhaps led him, for he went to the valley and sur- 
piisetl her at the spring. So confused was she that 
she ran to ask him to turn back and wait for her; 
but so won was she by his sweet greeting that she 
forgot all else and wandered long in the pleasant 
ways. Tiien when she remembered and ran back to 
stay the flow of the fountain, the stone was hidden 
deep beneath the waters which had gushed forth. 
She plunged beneath the waters ; her lover-knight 
plunged after her ; and there they abide to this 
day. 

From the smallest and most beautiful of the three 
lakes — the U[)i)er Lake — the Long Range makes a 
channel, parting at Dinish Island to join on the one 
side Muckross Lake, and on the other Lough Leane 
— the Lower Lake. The water \\;;y just before- the 
dividing of the Long Range at Dinish Island, be- 
neath tlu' (^Id WV^r {bridge, is a mad current, need- 
ing a sk'ilful pilot to make the jxiss. 

From lovely Dinish Island the water way leads 
beneath the lirick'een liridge into the Lower Lake — 
Lough Leane — a gentle stretch of water when the 
winds are stilled, but jiassionate and furiously rough 
when the breezes swt-ep down from the mountains 
to excite it. At the far end the river Laune forms 
its outlet. 



Banlry Hay (o Larnc, 43 

A long shaded way, Icadin^r from Killarncy village 
past the estate of I , Old Koiiniajo, brought us early 
one morning to the ruins of Ross Cast it; overlook- 
ing T.oui;li Leaue. I leie dwelt the great O'Doua- 
luie in the days of Cromwell's invasion. i'liere was 
a legend that this stronghold could never he taken 
1)\' land. A )'oung girl of tlu- village, who knew 
ho.w strong was the faith of the garrison in this tra- 
dition — so the story goes — was woed by one of 
Cromwell's men, and revealed the secret in a confi- 
dential mood to him.. One iuoining the garrison 
saw a fleet of boats ap[)roaching from around the 
point 0/ a near island. Giving way at once to de- 
spair, they surrendered without a shot, while the 
O'Donahue leai)cd from the top of the castle into 
the waters of the lake. 

The boatman who was our guide, counselor, and 
raconteur, in a most delightful day ujion the lakes, 
told us this legend, and added : " An' he a[)pcars 
iv'ry siven years, gintlemin, an* if ye comes here 
nixt May, shure yc may say him." 

As we rowed away from Rcrss Castle, Roberts, 
the boatman, pointed to a little island of scarcely a 
rood in surface : — 

"An' there's where sich of the O'Donahuc's min 
as were refractory were sint, an' he gave thim 
enough bread, but he said, ' Shure yc'll no be 
wantin' inythin' to -drink whin there's so much 
water aroun' ! " 

A curious rock-formation is called " O'Donahue's 
honeycomb," and on the authority of Roberts if one 



44 A (lokkn Wa}'. 

crumbles a bit into a glass of water, it will cure the 
toothache. 

In INIuckross Lake is a small island called "Dev- 
il's Islam!." 

" iXu' let me tell yes," said Roberts, " how thet 
island came there. Do ye say thet mountain up 
there with the hole in the side? Well, the divil one 
marnin' hetl jist taken a bite out of thet mountain 
for his breakfastj and jjjone on a w.ilk across the lake, 
whin he met the ( )"I)onaluie. 4"he O'l )onahue was 
a very polite man, an' whin he met tiie divil, ' (-lood 
marnin' to your lardship,' says the O'Donahue. 
Now the tlivil tlid not wish to be outdone in polite- 
ness by the O'Donahue, an' ' Gooti marnin' to your- 
silf,' says the divil. An' whin he opened his mouth, 
the mouthful fell out an' made thet island. 

" I was a-tellin' these stories, some years ago, to 
some American _L]^intlemin," continued Roberts, "an' 
the nixt mornin' I met one of thim. lie came up 
to me, an' his face was thet sober thet I knew he 
had sorrow in his mind. *Ah, Roberts,' says he, 
' I have bad news for" ye.' * An' w hat may it be ? ' 
says I. ' It's sail inilade thet ye'U be,' sa\-s he, ' for 
your old frind, the tlivil, is dead.' ' Me frind, the 
divil is dead,' says I, an' I was dumfounded, an' I 
wint away an' I thocht for fifteen minutes. Thin I 
came back to the man, and I offered him a pinu}-. 
' What'll thet be for, Roberts?' says he. ' I wants 
ye to take it,' says I. ' Iiulade, Roberts, I don't 
want your pinny,' says he; ' why should I take it?' 
' Take it, an' I'll tell ye,' says I. There were some 



Bantry Bay to Larnc, 45 

young ladies with him, an' they tazed him to take 
the pinny, an' so he did. ' Now, Roberts,' says he, 
' tell me why you gave me the pinny.' ' Well,' says 
I, ' it is the custom in ouid Ireland, whin a parent 
dies, to take up a contribution for his beraved chil- 
dren. An' the pinny's your share,' says I." 

Into Muckross Lake the waters of the Tore Cas- 
cade rush through a narrow wooded defile after 
breaking into white foam over a ledge seventy feet 
high, — having escaped from a pool away upon the 
Mangerton Mountains' that is called the " Devil's 
Punchbowl." Legend has it that this punchbowl is 
bottomless. 

"An' let mc tell yes," said Roberts, "two years 
ago an American gintleman came here, an' he wint 
up to thet very punchbowl. It was a 'very warm 
day, an' he says to me, ' Roberts, I'll be after havin' 
a swim here.' ■' Indade ye must not,' says I ; ' there's 
no bottom to the hole, sir.' ' Thin^ Roberts,' says 
he, * I'll jest dive through it.' An nather mesilf nor 
his frinds CQuld prevint him. So he made a great 
spring, an' down he wint. We waited for him to 
rise, an* he never came. Tin minutes, an' he wasn't 
back. AH-hour more, an' we-gathered up his clothes 
and wint back to his hotel. His frinds were dis- 
tracted, ail' they wint up the nixt day^ but there 
was no trace of him. They waited here two wakes 
for him, thiiikin' his body would rise, but it didn't. 
Now, gintlemin, twelve weeks from the day thet he 
dived there came a tilegram from Australia, sayin', 
' I've arrijted. Sind on me clothes.' " 



46 A ("loldcii Wny. 

yVilown l,oui;h Lc.mc, and on the wa)' to C^'Sulli- 
van's Cascade, we passed Stag Island, the scene of 
the O'SulHwm's famous fisliinq;. 

" The O'Sulh'van, Ltintleiuin,* said Ri>l)erts, " was 
a niiL;ht\- man. an' he Vwal in the mountains up 
there. An' he used to brew the hist punch in the 
workl, an' he was thet oinerous thet he useii to come 
to thet island an' offer it to i\'er)- oiu- who ]>asseil. 
An' while he wailetl, he used to fish, s^intlemin, 
rii;ht at thet pint. Now, one ila\', when the O'Sul- 
li\an came dt>wn to thet ishnul. he had a new ash 
pole thet he luul cut jest thet da)* on the mount. uns. 
An' no sooner hail l\e lluu;; his line than he hookeil 
a tremendous salmon. lie ]ndled an' he pulled, an' 
whin he had him jest abox-e tliewatei'. the rotl broke 
rij;"hl away in the middle, an' a\\a\- w iut the salmon 
with one-half the rod. 'Ah. well,' says the O'SuHi- 
\an, " it's later I'll be seein' ye.' The nixt ilav 
the (VSullix'an L;(it a new rod an' came .\i;ain to his 
isl.ind to fish. .An' no sooner h.ul he cast his line 
than he felt a tremenilous weii^ht at the ither end. 
;\n' thin the (^'Sulli\'an liint himself, .ni' he pulled 
with sich tremendous mii^ht thet he thiew his catch 
awa\' i>\'er on the nu>uutain x'ontler. Now atwehe- 
month before, gintlemin, some nunintain people 
a-goin' to market, had wrecketl their boat whh all 
their fukins of butter an' ei;L;s rii;ht in thet si)ot. 
An' whin the O'Sullixan made his catch, share it 
was a fine firkin of butter thet he caui^ht. An' he 
threw it with sich force, gintlemin, thet it killed 
a rid deer in the woods on the nu)untain. So 



Baiitry Ray to T.arne. 47 

tin- (^'Sullivan caui;ht a firkin of butter an' a rid 
elccr. 

" A twclvc-ycars later there was a dance o' the 
CDuntrv' people a\\a\- down on tiie brids^e over the 
Launc, at the- ind o' the hd<e, where the water rins 
out an' aw.iy to the sa\'. An' the O'Sullivan was 
there, an' he w as a-dancin' a bit of a jij^, for he was 
the bist dancer in the counthr\', an' whin tiie O'Sulh- 
van danced iverybody h:)()ked on an' chippit his 
h.mds to kape the time. A]\' while the O'Sulh'van 
was dancin' lie saw tjie' people rin to the side o' the 
bridi^e an' look out towards the way of the say. y\n' 
tin- (VSullivan stopped his dancin' an' wint to look- 
too. An' what In- saw w.is an ash tri-e a-standin' 
strait;hl out o' the water an' a-coniin' up the stream. 
An' what do you think, i;intlenn'n ! — it vvas the O'SuIli- 
van's broken ash rod with twelve years' growth on 
it, that the salmon thet ,i;ot away with it was a-brint^- 
in' back.',' 

If I have not numtioned sweet Innisfallen," it is 
that I mi^ht come back to it as our boat did, to enjoy 
its peacefubiess after the long^hay upon the lakes. 

It lies not f.ir from Ross ("astle, hui^e trees shad- 
ing;- it, and the softest of turf carpeting- it, with 
stretclies where th-e sun lies on it, turningjo a ^olilen 
<;reen its emerald verdure. Here is the lart;est 
aiul the oldest holly-tree in the world, and here a 
liawthorn into whose trunk the holly and the ivv 
have grown so closely as to form one texture. Here 
is a well that is ever filled with water — a curious 
cup on the side of a tree, five or six inches across 



48 A Golden Way. 

and eighteen inches deep, I found it brimming 
with the purest water. "An' whoever dips his hand 
in this water," said Roberts, " an' laves the wake 
part of his body, in faith may find his wakeness 
sthronger," — a sort of Delphic utterance. The ruined 
Abbey of Innisfallen leads back our thoughts thir- 
teen hundred years to that remote time when the 
leper, St. Finian Lobhar, founded these crumbling 
walls. The " Annals of Innisfallen," the oldest 
version of which is in the Bodleian Library of Ox- 
ford, was written by two monks, and was a history 
of the world to the time of St. Patrick in 432, and 
a narrative of events in Ireland from that time until 
1 3 19. The "Annals " says that " in 11 80 the Abbey,, 
which was considered the most secure place in all 
Ireland, and was the place of deposit of much gold 
and silver and precious goods, was plundered by 
Mildvvin, the son of Daniel O' Donahue, and many 
persons were slain in this very cemetery." 

Over one ancient grave, that of the Abbot, as 
some aver, or one of the ancient kings, as others say, 
nature has placed a curious protection. Above it 
grows adarge and venerable tree, so lifted into the 
air by its four huge roots that one may look beneath 
and see the stone of the grave. But the roots so 
bind and guard it that the stone cannot be removed 
or disturbed, save by destroying the tree. 

"The island,'' said Roberts, " is the bist grazin' 
land in all Ireland, an' if ye will belave it, gintlemin, 
if a ewe lamb be put in here to-night, he'll be a fat 
schape to-morrow." 



Bantry Bay to Larne. 49 

The evening fell as we pushed our boat from this 
fairy isle, over which the odors blew from blossom- 
ing hawthorns ; b)^ whose walks, trodden for more 
than a thousand }'ears by saijits and poets and — alas ! 
— men of blood and greed, the pure daisies turn up- 
ward their gentle faces, and the shamrock grows 
with more profusion and delicacy than elsewhere. 
I- bore bunches in my hands as I came away, 
bunches which Roberts had chosen for me, and I 
thought of how beautifully the Irish melodist sang 
its origin and meaning : — • 

" Thro Erin's isle, to sport awhile, 

As I-ove and Valor wandered, 
With Wit, the Sprite, whose quiver bright 

A thousand arrows squandered ; 
Where'er they pass a triple grass 

Shoots up with dew-drops streaming, — 
As softly green as emeralds, seen 

Thro' purest crystal gleaming. 

"Oh, the Shamrock ! the green immortal Shamrock! 
The chosen leaf of Hard and Chief, 
Old Pain's native Shamrock ! 

" Says Valor, ' See ! they spring for. me, 

These leafy gems of morning ! ' 
Says Love ! ' No, no — for me they grow, 
' My fragrant path adorning.' 
But Wit perceives the triple leaves, 

And cries, ' Oh, do not sever 
A type that blends three god-like friends. 

Love, Valot Wit, forever.' " 

The sky grew sullen as we came back to Ross 
Castle ; the water was no longer placid ; the waves 
tossed us ; and our boatman, plying his strong and 
4 -" 



50 A Golden Way. 

skilful arms, told us his last stoiy of the O'Dona- 
huc : 

" Now, gintleniiii, let me tell ye the last story 
about the O'Donahue. If }'e should see this lake 
some days, ye'd not belave a boat could liv^e to cross 
it. It's the O'Donahue thet's a-troubliii' it, an' let 
me tell ye why he troubles it. The O'Donahue was 
a man of mighty larnin', an' he had a power, gin- 
tlemin. He had agrade with the divil thet he should 
have the power to turn himself into any baste that 
walks the earth or flies in the air, or swims in the 
water. But if any woman, bad cess to thim ! — should 
shrake wliile lu- had tlie i)Ower, he must stay in the 
shape he was thin, whativer it might be. So the 
O'Donahue, for the pleasure of his friends, used to 
exercise his power, ])ut he took care thet on thim 
occasions no woman should be prisent to say him. 
Now the O'Donahue had a fine wife, an' he loved 
her as the apple of his eye. An' his wife's mither 
says to his wife : ' It's a fine power thet j-our hus- 
band has, an' it must be exsaydingiy amusin' to say 
him become a fine stag or a great fish.' ' Indade, I 
have niver seen him,' says the O'Donaluie's wife to 
her mither. 'Shure, it's a poor husband thet will 
not amuse his own wife,' says the O'Donaluie's 
wife's mither. ' Taze him to show ye his power, 
for it would shame ye to have ivery spalpeen in the 
county know thet the O'Donahue has the power, an' 
his own wife has niver seen it. So the O'Donahue'.s 
wife tazed her husband to show her his power. 
* Shure, me swatest heart,' says she, ' it's no fine thing 



Bantry Bay to Larne. 51 

that a stranger may say }'our meracles, an' your wife 
niver behold thim. Shrake, would I ? It's not in nie 
heart to shrake at any man, an' much less would I 
shrake at a baste.' So her bright eyes like the 
stars an' her yellow hair like the gold won the 
O'Donahue. Thin the O'Donahue became a splen- 
did stag sich as niver before, was seen, an' he 
ran roun' the court, ah' thin lay down at the feet 
of his 'wife. An' she clappit her pretty hands an' 
cried, ' Shure, an' I'm proud this day.' Thin the 
O'Donahue became a -mighty aigle, an' he flew to 
the top o' the mountain an' brought back a baby 
fawn in his beak. * Shure, jt's a happy wife thet I 
am,' says the O'Donahue's wife. Thin the O'Don- 
ahue would have stopped, but she begged him to be 
a fish. So the O'Donahue wint to the top of his 
castle, an' he made a sort o' pool there, an' he be- 
came an illigant great fish. An' he swam roun' an' 
roun'. An' as he swam the castle began to go roun' 
an' roun', too, all topsy-turvy like. An' whin the 
O'Donahue's wife saw the castle all whirligig, she 
shraked out suddently. Thiivthe O'Donahue leaped 
into the lake, an' there he is this minnit. An' whin 
he is mad, shure he stirs up the whole lake till a 
boat on it is no more, than a leaf. An' gintlemin, do 
)'e know why Adam was the happiest man in the 
world ? Because he had no mother-in-law, shure, 
gintlemin." 

It is a long and many chaptered story — that of 
the beautiful Emerald Isle. Its history emerges 



52 A Golden Way. 

from myths of giants and fairies, of magicians and 
soothsayers, of valiant knights and lovely ladies, like 
the morning land from the mists of the night. Lady 
CcTEsair ruled this land before the Deluge, and Par- 
tholan, a descendant of Japhet, was its lord after 
that event. A terrible pestilence swept the dread 
race of J^irtholan from the land, and then came 
Nemedh from the borders of the Black Sea. Later 
a tribe of negro sea-rovers, the Formosians, came 
from Africa and conquered the island, but, after a 
time, the Firbolgs, a division of the Nemedhians, 
returned, regained the country, and divided it into 
five kingdoms, one for each of the brothers who 
were their chiefs. 

Not long after this division another tribe of the 
Nemedhian race, the Tuatha de Danans, magicians 
from the country of Greece, won the land and they 
held it long. The Nemedhians were small in stature 
and dark in color. _ Pitted against them in the. next 
struggle for supremacy were the Aryans, robust, 
fair, tall, and mighty in all the arts of war. These 
Aryans are known in history as Gaels, Milesians, 
Scots, but most commonly Celts. They came from 
Britain and the shores of Spain, and were, probably, 
the descendants of the Pluenecians who settled 
early in those places. They foyght not only the 
strength but also all the mystic arts of the Tuatha, 
and, fighting, conquered. It is this Celtic race that 
has given L'eland its character, and its people their 
characteristics. It is the Celts that were the Irish 
people when tradition became history. Under 



Bantry Bay to I>arne. 53 

them Ireland had harbors and commerce, carrying 
the peaceful arts of trade to the shores of the Med- 
iterranean, and the bravery of war against the Ro- 
man strongholds in Britain and Gaul. These people 
were Druids. The first authentic figure in Irish his- 
tory appears when a young Gaul, St. Patrick, set up 
the Cross of Christianity against the rites of Druidism. 
St. Patrick was born in what is now Boulogne in 
France, atout the year 400. While he was yet a 
youth, Nial, the king of Ireland, overran France, 
and carried the young Patrick back to Ireland to be 
a slave,- and on the Antrim hills he tended the 
sheep of his master, Milcho. When he was twenty- 
tliree he escaped, and, returning to Gaul, became a 
most devout Christian. He lived in Tours awhile, 
and then went to Rome, where. he enjoyed high favor 
at the papal court. But ever before his eyes there 
rose the memory of the horrible sacrifices that he 
had' seen in the country of his slavery, ever there 
was with him the thought of the degradation and 
ignorance of this people, and in his dreams he seemed 
to see a scroll on which was insxribed, " The voice 
of the Irish." So, with the permission of Pope 
Celcstine, he went back to Ireland. He was beaten 
from the coast of -Wicklow, where he would have 
landed first, and so came to the country of his servi- 
tude, Antrim. His eloquence, his fire, his earnest- 
ness, excited the admiration of his enemies. He con- 
verted even the arch-priest of the Druids, and many 
of the highest chiefs. He changed the pagan days 
of celebration into Christian festivals. He founded 



54 A Golden Way. 

monasteries and established missions. He led in 
his retinue artisans of many trades, brewers, smiths, 
artificers in metals, workers in embroideries, and so 
diffused the gentle industries of peace.. Finally, in 
the monastery of Saul, erected where he first had 
preached the new religion in Ireland, he died at the 
ripe age of ninety, having brought the whole nation 
to loyalty to the Christian religion. 

Now Ireland became renowned for its piety and 
learning. It was called the " Isle of Saints." It 
was the seat of such schools that thousands of stu- 
dents from Europe came yearly to be taught there. 
Hut jealousy and ambition provoked internal troubles 
among the chiefs of the different provinces of Ire- 
land. Then followed the invasion by the Normans ; 
the subjugation by Henry of England ; the long 
centuries of factions and cpiarrcls ; massacres and 
seizures and persecutions by these foreign conquerors, 
until in 1642 the Ten Years Revolt started -its dread 
and bloody history. Then Cromwell became lord- 
lieutenant of Ireland, and led that remarkable army 
of Ironsides which had crushed the royal jiower at 
Naseby, to concpicr and convert the Irish. It is 
Cromwell with the Bible in one hand and the sword 
in the other, Cromwell who spared not the life of 
woman or child, but made the streets brooks of blood, 
that made Ireland desolate, and left a name with 
which the women frighten their disobedient children 
until this day. Cromwell, victorious, at first would 
have swept all the Irish from the land, but modified 
this intention so far that he drove them from the 



Baiitry Bay to Larne. 55 

fertile provinces of Ulster, Munster, and Leinster, 
into the less productive province of Connaught. 

Then came in succession the more tolerant 
Charles, James, who sought to establish Catholic 
supremacy, and William of Orange, the champion 
of Protestantism in ELurope, and the struggles of 
the adherents of James with those of the new king. 
So, on the banks of the river Boyne, thirty-six thou- 
sand nicrt under William, representing the Protes- 
tant cause, fought with thirty thousand Irish and 
P'rench, representing the Catholic cause, and the bat- 
tle, contested with the greatest bravery on both sides, 
resulted in the victory of the house of Orange. 
There followed the tyrannical penal laws that pros- 
trated Ireland at tlie beginning of the eighteenth cen- 
tury ; and the desperation of a people, that led them 
to form bands of " Whitcboys," and " Oakboys," 
to retaliate upon those who were their oppressors. 
In the midst of so much misery were born intellectual 
Irishmen and intellectual movements that sh-ine 
like sunlight upon the land in this darkened period. 
Swift, Berkeley, Skelton, and, later in the century, 
Sterne, Goldsmith, Burke, and Sheridan, gave luster 
to the Irish name in literature, while the Dublin Phil- 
osophical' Society, .the Physico-HIstorical Society, 
and the Dublin Society, gave an impetus to learning, 
arts, and industry, that was the seed of saving and 
redemption to Ireland. Gradually the penal laws 
were less rigidly enforced, but the struggle for equal 
rights for the Catholic and the Protestant was still 
active. Obstinate George the Third opposed such 



56 A Golden Way. 

equality, and out of the struggle came the insurrec- 
tion of 1798, in which Ireland, led by as noble a band 
of patriots as graces the pages of history, strove to 
throw off English- supremacy and become an in- 
dependent nation. The struggle was unavailing, 
and the defeat of the Irish was followed by the merg- 
ing of their parliament with that of the English 
parliament. 

There have been years of famine, later revolts, 
land leagues, and the assassination in Phcenix Park 
— most sad, indeed, for Ireland ! — to complete the 
woeful story of so many years. What the future has 
for Ireland we cannot discern, but if it be as fair as the 
face of the country, as bright as the wits of its people 
are quick and their hearts kind, the future historian 
will write peace, plenty, and prosperit\\ where the 
annalist of the past has inscribed struggle, famine, 
and misery. 

The way that led from Killarney to Dublin Mas 
long enough for me to think over this and much 
else of Ireland's story — so sad a story for so beauti- 
ful an island ! — and Dublin, called the eye of Ire- 
land, is full of things that remind one of her history. 
One of her cathedrals is that of St. Patrick. Trinity 
College recalls the zeal for learning that has made 
the land famous. The restrictions that until 1792 
forbade the granting of a degree to any Roman 
Catholic, and did not place them on an equality with 
Protestants until 1872, are remembrances of the pro- 
scription struggles. The statues of Edmund Burke 




MEADOW AND WINDING STREAM 



Page 56 



Bantry Ba}^ to Larne. 57 

and Oliver Goldsmith before the gateway of the 
university, keep fresh the memory of her statesmen 
and men of letters, while the statue of Grattan in 
College Green recalls the opposition to the union 
of the parliament of Ireland with that of England. 
What a picture for a national Irish Gallery would 
be that of this eloquent patriot, through whom Ire- 
land secured the independence of her parliament, 
dragging his feeble body into the House, eight years 
later, and, too feeble to rise, speaking with a fire 
that was ineffectual, but that glowed more and more 
brilliantly, that brought vehemence to his words and 
strength to his voice, against the bill for union. 

The stately buildings, guarded by red-coated 
sentinels, now the Bank of Ireland, were formerly her 
Hall of Parliament. Nelson's tall monument honors 
the record of Ireland's sons in naval warfare, while 
Phoenix Park recalls the tragedy, the murder of 
Lord Cavendish, that has set the cause of greater 
independence back many years. 

Out from the slums beggars stole their way to 
Sackville Street, women with anaemic infants 
wrapped in their shawls, old hags, looking like the 
witches of Macbeth, — the seamy side of life asserting 
its presence in a street along which the rich swept 
in their carriages, and whose shops attested the 
ministering to luxury. There were riots, too, while 
we were there, — the old, old outbreak of hot blood 
between the green and the orange. 

From Dublin to Belfast the way is for a long 



58 A Golden Way. 

distance within sight of the Irish sea, and over its 
surface the white-winged boats, Hke birds, were 
skimming. Along the sea beaches the kelp-gatherers 
were loading the gift of the sea into their brown 
carts. Meadows full of large golden iris gave the 
touch of yellow that the gorze had hitherto afforded, 
and golden poppies grew luxuriantly by the neatly- 
kept railway stations. So the land seems impartial 
in this contest of colors, and wears upon her breast 
the green and orange alike. We passed Drogheda, 
where even now the cabmen point out the street that 
was astream with the blood shed by Cromwell's 
Ironsides — and Ironhearts. We went by Lisburn 
where acres of the soft green turf were covered with 
sheets of linen cloth and heaps of linen thread, — 
the blcacJiing greens, — seen nowhere else in the 
world. 

If I had not taken a long walk that brought me 
to the University part of Belfast, and to its Botanic 
Garden, I should have written down the cit)- as un- 
interesting, but in this quiet quarter there is com- 
pensation for the bustle and noise of the business 
part. The Garden is as interesting as any in the 
two worlds, and the beautiful fern house, where 
each variety grows as in its native haunts, and where 
the skilful arrangement of walks, the increase of 
distances by the effect of mirrors, the placing of 
miniature waterfalls here and there, make pictures 
for the artist and give delight to the botanist, has 
the added grace of an enthusiastic and most court- 
eous curator. 



Bantry Bay to Larne. 5Q 

Though a thousand charming places in this 
wonderful island said, " Lead hither, lead hither ! " 
the golden way led now to Larne, and across to 
Scotland. Larne is a prettily situated town, but 
fairer far than any beauty of situation, is " Helen's 
Tower" and the filial love to which it is a monu- 
ment. It enshrines some verses which the mother 
of the present Earl of Uufferin addresseu to him on 
his coming of age : 

TO MY DEAR KOV ON HIS 21ST BIRTHDAY. 

Wrm A SILVER LAMP. 

Fiat Lux. 

How shall I bless thee ! human love 

Is all too poor in passionate words; 
The heart aches with a sense above 

All language that the lip affords: 
Therefore a symbol shall express 

My love, a thing nor rare nor strange, 
But yet eternal, measureless, 

Knowing no shadow and no change : 
Light, which of all the lovely shows 

To our poor world of shadows given, 
The fervent prophet-voices chose 

Alone as attribute of heaven. 
At a most solemn pause we stand; 

From this day forth forevermore 
The weak but lovnig human hand 

Must cease to guide thee as of yore ; 
Then as through life thy footsteps stray 

And earthly beacons dimly shine, 
■' Let there be light " upon thy way, 

And holier guidance than mine. 
« Let there be light " in thy clear soul 

When passion tempts or doubts assail s 



6o A Golden Way. 

When grief's dark tempests o'er thee roll 
"Let there be light " that shall not fail. 

So, angel-guarded, may'st thou tread 

The narrow path which few may find; 
And at the end look back nor dread 

To count the vanished years behind ; 
And pray tliat she whose hand doth trace 

This heart-warm prayer, when life is past, 
May see and know thy blessed face 

In God's own glorious light at last. 



III. 

AUI>D AYR ro EDINBURGH. 

O Caledonia, stern and wild, 
Meet nur.se for a poetic child, 
J^and of hrown heath and shajjgy wood. 

From Larnc to Stranraer, from Imju to Scotia, 
there is a nasty bit of sea — the English adjective 
quite expresses its quah'ty, — ([uickly forgotten how- 
ever, in the ride to Ayr, — 

" Auld Ayr, whom ne'er a town surpasses 
For honest men and hanilsome lassies." 

I had thought of A)'r, carelessly of course, as a 
simple hamlet, a few cottages huddled together into 
a neighborhood, stretches of farmland, and naught 
but the memory of l^obby JUirns to give it interest 
and color. So the city of Ayr with its fine harbor, 
steamers arriving and departing, ships a-building, 
the wide sands, the grand promenade along its beach, 
its beautiful villas, antl its general bustle and thrift, 
was a surprise. Ikit the older quarter was dis- 
tinctly reminiscent of the poet. His statue stands 
in the square, the shops are full of i)ictures and 
souvenirs of him, and the inns have names that sug- 
gest his poems and appeal to the tourist. But 
Burns was born in a |)arish of Ayr, Alloway, — and 

thither we walked along the road over which once 

61 



62 A Golden Way. 

Taiii O'Shantcr rotlc on his L!,ray marc, Meg;. The 
way was of little interest, although the larks soared 
and sung", the trees, bentlin<j^ above us, j^ave shifting 
shadows and lii;lUs to the road, the few cottages 
were trim .ind neat, and tlie hedges that shut us 
deeply in auvl hid all the wayside views were trimlx* 
cut. Out frcuii this luHlged-in. wa)' we came sud- 
denly to the bare Allowa\- neighborhood, its cot- 
tages set close to the roatl antl seeming to lie asleep 
in the full sun. 

The Burns cottage crowds close ni)on the roail. 
To tiie original home, still thatch-roc^fed, two ad- 
ditions have been made, one at either eml ; so it is 
now a trij)le cottage, with three front iloors, the 
second being that of the oUl house, in the pho- 
tograph one division is hidden because of the angle 
at which it joins the first structure'. I^ntering the 
third door, and passing through a turnstile, we were 
met b}' a neat woman who took the " tu[)pence-ha' 
penu)' " admission, and showed us directlx' to the 
room where Burns was born. 'l"he lloor is llagged 
as of old, the fireplace that burnetl bright in his day 
shows its well-swept hearth, and a niche in the wall 
holds the bed wherein he was born. When his fam- 
ily lived here the room was lighted onl)' b\- a little 
window a f<u>t stpiare, with four tiny lights of glass. 
The old dresser owned by Hurns's father is in the 
room, but all of the rest of the furniture is of more 
recent date. Across a small dividing entry is the 
old " best room," now used for the sale of pictures 
and mementoes. 



\ "■■'f- 







C 




THI I'.DUNS COTTAdI , ALLOWAY ('ago 62 



Aiild Ayr to Edinbur.L;"h. 63 

In the new part of the house is an interesting 
collection of Burns memorials, among them his com- 
monplace book, recently bought for $365, and the 
original manuscript of Tain O' Shajitcr. The page 
of the poem on which my glance fell contained the 
oft quoted lines : — 

" But pleasures are like poppies spread. 
You seize the flower, the bloom is shed ; 
Or like the snow falls in the river, 
A moment while then melts forever." 

How much of Hiirns's dee[)cr moralizing he wrought 
into his poems ! No one, surely, has expressed the 
moral waste of his life more sadly than he in his poem 
to the mouse whose nest the plow-share had des- 
troyed : — 

" Still tlioii art blest compan.-d wi'me! 
The present only toucheth thee : 
But, Och ! I backward cast my e'e 

On prospects drear ! 
An' forward, tho' I canna' see, 

I guess and fear." 

In the room are Tarn O'.Shantcr's chair, the Stir- 
rup Cup with the inscri])li()n, 

" Nae man can tether time or tide ; 
The hour approaches, Tam maun ride: 
— That hour o'Night's black arch the key-stane," 

a candlestick and toddy-cup used in " Nanse Tan- 
nock's," Mauchline, — and there are on the walls 
bas-reliefs, copies of those on his monument, rep- 



^>4 



A (u)l(K'n Wav 



rescntiiit;" Tlic \'isio)i—\.\\c spirit of pootn- appear- 
ing lo Burns in this nulc hut, - ///(' (offitr's Sdfiir- 
<An' A'/i,'///, ami /'(tin at Alloi^'av Kirk. Ilu- ihin- 
poetical tributes placctl conspicuousU' in Hu- rooni 
arc each by an Anioriean anlhoi, 1 ,onL;l\'lK)\\ 's t\- 
(piisitf poiMU, Rolurt /^iiiiis, l'"it /-(Irci-nr llallink's 
/'(' ii A'l'sr />f(>//<^/// front lunr Alloi^'tw l\irk\ in 
.Ivrs/iirr, in the Autitmii oj x'^ii, anil .i ni-\\spapi-r 
clippini;, a ptn-m, Wrifftii in Ihirns's Cofftii^w sitMU-d 
" An Anicricm." 

A little \\a\- bi-)'()n(l this i.;rin"ns-liaiinle(l rottas^i" 
we found Allowiw Kirk, tlu" luins ol ,i sm.ill t liuieli, 
the sides st.indiili;, the loof ^(MU-, its d.ite I 5 1 ( >, its 
ehureh)Mnl closely tenanted with the dead. in 
front of llu> Kirk is the L;ra\'e o{ l>inns's fathci with 
his son's biMiit il ul tiibute iiit on tlu- b.iel^ ol the 
stone-. 

()n the steps sat an old ni.in, who lesponded to 
some (piestion of nunc b\- repelling; in 1 ii h Seoteh 
di.deet a lon^^ (Kseri[)t ion liom /',//// (^' S//<n//< r, and 
w ho t lu-n bi-eame oui' ;,Miide about the wird ami Kirk. 

It was .1 drawinj.'^ ol Allow a\- Kiik in (irosse's 
.} n/i(//n/iis <>/' Sn'/Zd/zd, that caused Inirns to put 
in metrical form the stor\- that had Ioul; bien told 
of a m.m who, ridim; home liom A\f l.ile oiu- ni^ht, 
saw a liidit in Allowa\' Kirk. l.t-il b\' cuiiosit\' to 
look in, he fouuil th.it a dance of w itches was in full 
aetieni, tlu' l)e'il himself pla\iui; tlu- bai;pipe. N(»w 
one of these witclus was st) anim.iti'd in d.incin^, 
her garment fell so far .d)o\<' hei ankles, that tin- 
spectator forgot himself autl ciied " W'ccl loupcn, 




AILOWAY KIRK 



Pago G4 



Aulcl A}r to K(linbiiii;h. 65 

short sark ! " Instantly the wliolc fiend mob was 
in full chase after him, and his cscai)e was as narrow 
as that of Tani. The door wherein 'lam looked is 
that shown in the [)icture. 1 took another view of 
the front, a little ^irl who was eating a huge i)iece 
of bread sitting on the steps, but the nuiitl covered 
her modest face with her arm, ami gave a shy glance 
from the crook of her elbow, and — well, I feel sure 
that this motlern little witch was more successful 
than the ones of old with "i'ani, for a plague fell on 
the plate, and the image looked as if the old Nick 
himself had had a hand in its development. 

When Irving visited Alloway, he found a car- 
penter working among the ruins to convert it into a 
schoolhousc. This man had known Burns, and paid 
him the graceful tribute of saying that, " it seemed 
as if the country had grown more beautiful since 
Burns had written his bonnie little songs about it." 

He who is interested in Burns goes, of course, to 
see the collection of memorials in the Burns Monu- 
ment, and then he wanders to " Bonnie Doon," and 
lingers by its banks and braes, or he crosses the auld 
brig o' Doon, and stands for a moment above the 
keystane where Maggie saved her master but left 
behind her ain gray tail. 

Along the bay road back to Ayr the hawthorn 
was in full bloom, the views more extended and 
beautiful than those on the Tam O'Shanter road. 
Some great draught horses in the pasture on the 
other side of the fence, arched their strong necks 
and went galloping and prancing over the hills, re- 
5 



66 



A (^(.Ukii Wav 



lurniiifj to look at us with tlu'ir bi-autiful, intcllii^ent, 
e\'cs, and sccniing to say, " The auUi Alai; spirit still 
lives." 



The i]jrcat busy city of Glas;j[ow furnislu'd us but 
a night's loili^jiug on our wa)' to Locii Lonu)n(l. 
The cla\' was too rare, the s\<y deep bhu-, tlu- air 
clear and deliciously cool,— -to besptiit in thehaun*:. 
of men, but it was itieal for the laki- route. We en 
tcreil Loch Lomond wheri' the Leven flows from it, 
at l^allochport. The chaini of the ret^ion is felt im- 
medi.itely by him who floats upon these waters. 
Surroundi'd by rut;L;"ed and jiold mountains, si udded 
with pictures(jue islands, the enchantment of days 
of strui^gle and coml)at makin*;" every peak and val- 
ley storied, I felt as if 1 were crossing" some water 
plain that stretched before the rami)arts of a ^reat 
stroui^hold, still armed and ^uartled, still besieoed 
and deftMuled, by mijrhty but shadowy warriors. 
Seen from Loch Lomond, Hendomond is a monarch, 
majestic, dijjjnified ; ln-n-\'oirlich, lien-arthur, anil 
Ben-venue do him homai^e, and yet i-ach retains a 
supremac)' of its own. The little viihi^es arc so 
small antl so peaceful, the mountain sides are so 
(piiet. that one is almost astonished to recall that 
the Macl'^arlands came down lik'e wolves in the ni-^ht 
upon the nestling hamlet of Luss and put to the 
sword every man, woman, and chiUl that was found 
there; that the feutls of the C'ohpihouns and Mac- 
gregors made of a peaceful glade the " Valley of La- 
mentation ; " that the clan Macgregor for its atro- 



Auld Ayr to Edinburgh. ()"] 

cities was so outlawed tliat for four of them to meet 
together was a capital crime ; and that the Amazo- 
nian wife of Rob Roy dared face the host of those 
who pursued her husband here, asking, " Why istiic 
lantl of my fathers invaded?" 

When we changed boats before crossing Loch 
Katrine, the lad who sold papers and views on the 
boat, a neat and pleasant Scotch laddie, gave me a 
bunch of beautiful pansies " for thoughts." They 
were pleasant thoughts of the day and the journey 
and the courtesy of a stranger lad, but there were 
other thoughts, — for when I recalled the bloody and 
merciless forays of these old Scotch clans, to whom 
neither sex nor infancy was an api)eal, I thought 
more tenderly of our red men, in whose untutored 
breasts passions no more restrained had given birth 
to deeds no more atrocious. 

I said that Ben-voirlich, Ben-arthur, and I^en-venue, 
while doing homage to Ben-lomond, had each a su- 
premacy of its own. Loch Katrine seems to lie 
within the dominance of Ben-venue. So thought the 
great Wizard of tlie North, who has made this land 
alive for all time with the characters of the Lady of 
the Lake. It is with the eyes of the Knight of the 
Chase that each traveler sees this enchanting loch : — 

" One burnished sheet of living gold 
Loch Katrine low beneath him rolled, — 
In all her length far winding lay 
With promontory, creek, and bay, 
And islands that, empurpled bright, 
Floated amid the livelier light ; 
And mountains that like giants stand 



68 A r.olck-n Way. 

To sentinel enclianted lanil. 

Iligli on the south huge l?en-venue 

Down on the hike in masses threw 

C!rags, knolls, and mounds, confusedly hurled, 

The fragments of an earlier world. 

A wildering forest featheretl o'er 

His ruined sides and summit iioar." 

No liistory-li. united castle orgrandein-oilclecl palace is 
viewed witli more interested ^azc than that that falls 
on " Fallen's Isle." An exquisite fragment of land it 
is, where heather and ferns form the softest of syl- 
van carpets, and mountain-ash trees, slender birches, 
somber pines, and here and there a venerable oak, 
form arched coverings, and the dark rocks are 
lightened by pale gray lichens. Romance was never 
localized in a spot more befitting. 

Beyond Katrine \.\\q goldcii 7C'(n', whose track had 
lain across the Scottish lakes, lighted now the road 
through the Trossachs. And such a beautiful road ! 
Its beginning is amid birch trees, set well apart, — 
the sun flootling the s[)aces between them and dis- 
playing the soft, green foliage that lies upon their 
graceful, swaying limbs as lightl}' as a sea-green robe 
upon a blontle maiden. The way lies along rugged 
mountain sides with distant views of lake and hill. 
In early summer the heather sleeps brown on all 
these hills, the white birches gleaming against it ; 
but in August aiul September it wakens and swathes 
them with royal puri)le. The black and white moun- 
tain sheep were everywhere cropping the short grass 
as we rode through, and the little lambs were frisk- 



Anid ,\\i" lo iMliiihiii'jIi. 



r,() 



in<^ as all living youth docs. Hack and forth ami 
around our niouutaiu wa^^on wound throuj^h succes- 
sive .111(1 i:vcr lu.-w n-vcl.it ions of hcatily, to Al)iM'- 
foylc. 

Our coin|)ain'ons on this ride were mostly Scolcil 
people, with a very a^rci-ahle s|)irit of Scotch pleas- 
antry. Some discussion of fees and the ever open 
palm of tin: servants led me to tell the old stoiy of 
the Ami-rican who went away from his husiness for 
chan[^e and icst. " i'ut, ah," said he, " the waiters 
y;oi the chauj^e and the landhnds !.;ot the rest." 
riu; threadbare story louclu.'d the Scotth sense of 
humor, and tlK:y '.Mimiy chuckled over it foi" a louj^ 
time. Their stoiies were mainly of tlu: visit of the 
(Jueen and the- I'rincc Consort to this re}.non. 

" 1 )id yc; hear," said one, " w hat an Id Nance 'lavish 
said to her Majesty ? ' (iod bless my eyes,' said auld 
Nance, ' that I have lived to see this day. An' how 
old is your Majesty, an' how old is Mr. Albert?' 
Antl it was Nance's j^oodman who said to her 
Majesty wluMi she; |.nMciously thanked him for sonu: 
service, ' Moot, woman, baud yertonjMie! What's 
a trillc like that between me and ye?' " 

The driver pointed to a little loch as vvc- be^^ail 
t he descent to Aberfoyle. " That 's I ,och I )runki(l," 
said he, "but some folks call it Loch Whisky." 
" Loch Whisky, in Scotland?'' was the (puck re- 
spouse, " Sure: man, a lake by that name would be 
diuids dry immedi.it ely." 

< )n the train from Aberfoyle to I"',dinburf^h we saw 
a new type- -the farm lads and lassies, — such a class 



7o A (loldcii Way. 

as 'I'homas I lard)' skiiilu's so laithlulU' and so rcpul- 
si\Tl)' ill his later iio\cls. It was tlu- i.\Ay w luii old 
h.iil^ains riidcd .iiid new oiu's Ixi^aii, and tlusi- farm 
boys .iiid i;ii is wc'ic tliaii^iii!.; plarcs .iiid iin|)lo\H'rs. 
'I'hcir lariu' iniisriilar liands were t;riiiUHl A\\i\ cal- 
loiisrd l)\' oiilol door w oi k, Imt tluir laci's had a ccr- 
tain aninial I>cMiity and were far belter than their 
manners. Thc-y ch.dTed and bantereil each other in 
a dialeil ol w liith I eoiild iindeistaiul onl\' tlu' luimor ; 
one over another the\' crowded their iieads out (>f 
the \viiuh)ws on eaeh side of tin- eoinpai t nuiit and 
shouted compliments to the plaeis and peopK- that 
they w I'le lea\iiit; ; and when I he t rain sped on t lu-\' 
still huiii;, a sort ol s^rinnim; rost'tle dc-eoialion, on 
either siilc of the car. W'Iumi the\- had K-ft us almost 
breathless after such an exuberant dis|)la\' of lifi-, tlu' 
seat opposite me was takc'ii b\' a l,dl .lusteii'-lookinL; 
Scotchman, liaiiini^- the fretpunt tappiuj;" of his snuff, 
box, he was more pliMsant than his looks, and more 
communicative than I had reason to ex|)ect. .Sonu- 
chance iiMiiark, s<miic cpiotation from liurns, openeil 
a llcxul^.ite. Ileit'pt'ated IWirns's poiausto me witii 
dimimiciulo and crescendo nu)vements, with fortis- 
simo and pianissimo passaL;i.-s, until I found the 
movenu-nt of the car selliiiL; itself to a stanza of . / 
rrtiViT : — 



" Ittit iC I nuist allliitetl be, 

I'o stiil SOUK' wise (li'sif;;ii ; 
I'lifM in. Ill mv siuil will) liiiii icsoivi's 
'l"o luMi ,111(1 imt u'piiic." 

It must have been in sheer ilesper.ition, ami rv <7 



Auld Avr to Edinburgh. 



71 



aniiis, that I forced in somi' coniplinicnt on the love 
for iUirns tliat Scotlantl shows. I think that 1 
alhuled to the powii' that his poems liad in rousing 
to uttnaiui- tlic iMiiiiis of Whil t it-r. 'llu' theme was 
changed, and the i)oems of the vScotch bard were fol- 
K)wed by a recital of tribntes, rhymed and prose, by 
the ^rcat and tiu' obscure. 1 felt the wheels going 
round in m\' lu-ad ; my <ars ached ; I thought of the 
water torture, \\herel)\' the lonstaiit falling of siicces- 
siv^e drops upon ihe head of the victim drives him to 
madui'ss. I smiled at llu: grotcsqucncss of my i)os- 
sil>U' ei)itaph, " Died of lUirns on the tympaiuim." 
1 never before was so glad to reach a station as on 
that day to come to l^(iiid)uigh, but some fiend 
l)rompted the man to the generosity of carrying one 
of my bags to tin* hotel, and incidentally repeating a 
few linc;s from Hums. 

" Uidn't he bore you a little? " said my brother, 
who had been able to escape from the flood by mov- 
ing to the most distant corner of the compart- 
ment. 



It happened that our visit to Edinburgh fell at a 
time wluMi the great and general convocation of 
I'resbyterian ministers is held there to settle all the 
fine questions Ihataiise within the church, to tlis- 
cipline and defiiu' tin- standing of those whose odor 
of sanctity has not cpiite the Presbyterian savor, and 
to draw taut the lines wdiich shall hold them in their 
exi)oundiu!4S during the year to come. The hotels 
were full of the participants in this parliament of the 



^2 A Golden Wa}'. 

church. They engai^ed all the public writing and 
reading rooms, and stretched their white-cravetted 
ecclesiastical persons at full length on the sofas in 
the public parlors. I am going to say a very little 
about them, and I am going to forget a great deal, 
— but because they monopolized everything on this 
particular part of the face of the earth, because the 
odor of their tobacco was as pestilential as it was 
thick and ubiquitous, because I liked not the spirits 
that warmed aiul ccMnforted them until the late hours 
of the night, because —well, for many becauses, at 
the end of a week my soul grew weary of such 
saintly men, and I lovetl them not. 

It is Stevenson in his Picturesque Notes on Ildiu- 
burgh who says that on a Sabbath morning " all man- 
ner of loud bells join or rather disjoin in one swelling 
brutal babblement of noise. . . . Indeed there are 
not many uproars in this world more dismal than 
that of the Sabbath bells in F.dinburgh : a hartl 
ecclesiastical tocsin ; the outgrowth of incongruous 
orthodoxies, calling on every separate conventicler 
to put up a protest, each in his own synagogue, 
against * right-hand extremes and left-hand defec- 
tions.' " It was to these " sweet bells jangling " 
that we crossed the riverless valley that separates 
the new town from the old, and climbed the stcjjs to 
the Castle hill. From the parade ground we looked 
up at the grim old walls that have seen so much and 
such exciting history, and whose annals, with those 
of the two fortresses that have been destroyed be- 
fore its building, are the history of Scotland itself. 




r-%, lit «*JJr ,,, 

/■.j''Jlvj.r,j;i|,ii*!Jf--!i ^; 
t 



THE CASTLE OF EDINBURGH 



Page 72 



Aiild A}!" lo lOdiiihiiit^h. 



73 



'llic I'lsplan.uK' has witnessed many a deal h of vio- 
lenic, I .ady (dam mis, tlie beanty of the land, hiii ned 
in I 5^7, the heiclies slian<.dcd and hniiicd in I^.^S, 
while James liimsi'll h)oked <.;iindyon, tieason and 
witchcraft and mnrder ijein<^f here pnii'.ed from the 
land I))' Inc, tin- st ran;.dei's knot , and tlic In adman's 
ax. Here was born to IVI.iry, James Sixth of Scot- 
land and b'iist of I'ai>_dancl, and when the nu'ssent^uT 
bor<- t he news to tin- I'ae'jisli (|n(iii, t he lest ivil ies in 
progress were stayed, and sjie saidc down cryinj.;,, 
" My eonsin of Scotland is the; mother of a fair son, 
and I ,mi bnt a barren slock." 

Mere the r<''_alia of Scotland, which had Ixcn de- 
livered to the I'.ail ol (lIas^';ow in 1707, rested undis- 
CoVei'e(| iiiitil iSiS, when they were lonnd hidden 
beneath some linen in an old ( Inst the sale j)laee 
in which they were placed one iiundred and eleven 
years before. 

As we j^azed ovc-rlhe rani|)arts on that lair Sab- 
bath nn)rnin}^', sec:in^ erven to the (ic-rman ()cean on 
the east and to Sterling.;' on the west, the (Irampian 
hills bai rin;^ the view on the noi 1 h and the I 'en t lands 
on the- sonth, the: sonnd of dinm and pipe came, 
sonndin^'' near and nearer, and then the airay of sol- 
diers retnrnin^ fiom c-arly service; at St. (iile-s. 

I'Or the later service; I went to this old chnrch, 
and, bein^; early, saw well the; Norman ])illars whic h 
datt; back to the eleven I h c:ent nry, and h.id abnndant 
tinn- to niorali/e; bc;neath the (ki^s and shreds of 
ll.i^s which haiij^ above the main aisle, — consecrated 
here before they were carried in the desperate coii- 



74 A Golden Way. 

flicts that replaced the beauty of their folds b\' the 
glory of their service. 

At the end of the church there was a window that 
seemed to glorify all the place. All else was dark 
and somber, but there the light shone in, strained, 
transformed, and painting an entrancing picture. 
The lower part of the window was the Passion of our 
Lord, the upper part, liis Ascension. Above, angels 
enraptured turned their faces, all enkindled by the 
tlivine light from the Holy One, unto us who sat in 
shadow. 

Meanwhile the church was becoming filled, the 
organ was sounding with deep impressiveness, but 
there was a general air of expectation that aroused 
my wonder. There was an impressive pause, a turn- 
ing of heads, and up the main aisle came the Town 
Council in all the glory of scarlet robes and all the 
dignity of the emblems of authority. The Lords of 
the Synod followed, while through the side aisle the 
r''aculty of the Universit}% in their academic robes, 
advanced. A hush, a deeper, fuller strain of music, 
and all rose and remained standing while the Lord 
High Commissioner, the representative of the Queen 
at this church parliament, came in. Then the gather- 
ing of the worshipers having culminated, the service 
went simply and soberly on. 

It was in this old church that Jenny Geddes's stool 
dealt a blow to ritualism that brought it to death 
almost as soon as it came into life. 

Jenny kept a vegetable stall in High Street, but 
was a constant and watchful attendant at St. Giles, 



Anld Ayr to Edinburgh. 75 

with the spirit of revolt against form and ritualism 
glowing hot in her breast. So when on a July sab- 
bath in 1637, Dean Hanna began to read the collect, 
Jenny flung the folding stool on which she had been 
seated full at his head, and with better markmanship 
than is characteristic of her sex. " Out, thou false 
thief!" she shouted, "dost thou say mass at my 
lug [ear] ! " 

The presence of the Lortl High Commissioner re- 
minds us that while he is in attendance at the synod, 
Ilolyrood is his palace, and open only to his guests. 
" Vov fifty weeks together " — to quote Stevenson — 
" it is no more than a show for tourists and a museum 
of old furniture ; but on the fift3'-first behold the 
palace reawakened and mimicking its past. The 
Lord High Commissioner, a kind of stage sovereign, 
sits among stage courtiers ; a coach and six and clatter- 
ing escort come and go before the gates ; at night the 
windows are lighted up, and its near neighbors, the 
workmen, may dance in their own houses to the 
palace music." 

There is a tradition that once an underground way 
connected the Castle with St. Giles, and went thence 
to the Palace of Holyrood ; and that a piper volun- 
teered to explore it, playing a strathspey on hiswa\'. 
To the music of this slow reel with its sudden jerks, 
a group of youths and maidens danced above his 
head. But when this piper-mole had burrowed his 
way to St. Giles, there came in his music a more 
curious stop than was ever written — and no one there- 
after found either the passage or the piper. 



76 A Golden Way. 

As for Ilolyrood, it being- closed to me because 
the Lord High Coniniissioner was in residence,! saw 
not the king's crown " for a sixpence," nor the rooms 
within, so tragic with the memories of ]\Iar\-, and I 
did not stand " for a sixpence" wlierc within its walls 
feasting and ilancing and murder iiave UKule scenes 
in the drama of royal life. I cannot hohl the scales 
of histor}', nor measure accuratel)' how much of char- 
ity or condeumat ion should he thrown around oi' up- 
on that troubled life that began when Queen Mary 
returnetl fiitm I'^rancc: in 15^)1. Vov on that first 
night in the land of her realm, she had said her 
prayers as a Catholic and retired to rest ; " ami there 
came under her window a crew of fiv^e or six hundred 
scoundrels from the city, who gave her a serenade 
with wretched \-iolins and little rebecks, and began 
to sing psalms so miserably mistimed and mistuned 
that nothing could be worse." 

"God save that sweet face!" cried an old woman 
as she first went to Parliament, but the blessing 
availeil Ium" little. lk\autiful, witty, accomjilished — 
for she read la\-y and other histories with George 
lUichanan, thundered at !))• John Knox in .St. 
Giles, "My suljjects must obey you and not me," 
she exclaimed to him in anger and sadness, — a crea- 
ture and a \'ictim of strong passions, an intriguante 
and beset with intrigue, (ov her the sea of life was in 
its most tempestuous mood, and its violence snb- 
siiletl only when, with the crucifix at her lips, slie 
went beneath the lieadsman's ax, beyond its do- 
main. Stc jtur ad Judiccm ! 




<»*• ~ ■' ' .U^: 



HOLYROOD PALACE 



Page 76 



Aiild ,\\i It) ImIiii1)iii -'li. 



77 



(^iit liiiiii 1 hr v.isl iiiiml)ti- ol lc;.;fn(ls and laics 
lliat have spriiii;.; ii|) so tliiikl\' in this I'aliiihiiii'Ji, 
- -ICclwin's Hiii"l;1i, I)iiii IVloiiaidli, (lie ( il)' ol t lie 
Moor, t licv (.'.illc'd il am iciit ly, I / islchiii <• t lie l""i(iu li 
iiaiiicd il ill (hiii'ii Mary's tiiiU', wlicii 1 lie I lUcs and 
inaislifs siirioiiiuh'd llic iMcat riii!.;c of I lie ('astlc 
and the old tity, lluic is one donust ir sloiy thai I 
wish lo K cord. Il has \)rc\\ bonowcd, scl in the 
sci'ncry and al niosphci c of New I'audand, niadi- a 
talc to illustrah- ihc }.;rinuu'.ss and slcinncss of tlu- 
old Ni'w i^n^land ch.iractcr, but the soil whcrc-in it 
was 1)1 )rn is Scotch. 

This is the sloiy : In a single looni in an old 
house in I'",diid)ur<4li, situated on one of her nian\' 
(|uainl </(>si-s, lived two maiden sisters. Pious and 
slerii. they trod the n.iriow |)alli of theii' daily 
st'rvii'c, dr,iid< their lea ,\i){\ ale their hread, out: 
at either end ol the deal table, and al nijdit la)'^ 
down lo ii'st each in her own bed on her own side 
ol the room. lint the apple ol discord canu' in 
either b\' the door or the window. Thcic was a 
dilfeiiMU'c of jud[;inent on some minor article of 
fail h, a ditfi-rcnce that ^rew so mij^hty that il cleft 
the household. Narrowness of means prevented 
each from movins.>^. Thev h.ul but one table, one 
rircplaie, one dooiway. Ihil lhe\' drew a line that 
bisected the llreplacc: ,ind the doorway, and fell 
across the table. ( )n the riidil was Margaret's do- 
main, and on the left was Nancy's, And so they 
li\'<(l, trespassing neither in act or speech upon one 
anotlui-. I'".ach ixad her Hible in full si!.dil of the 



7S A (Golden Wmv. 

otlur .111(1 kiult ill pi.iycr iu)t .i ilo/.cn fcc-t ftoiu luT 
willi wlmm slu- was nol .it pi'.Kf. ICali s.U on her 
own sidr of [\\r l.ihK' and al Uc\ own coinrr of the 
III rpLuH' with closed lips and nnrclaxin^ steinnrss of 
l^a/.c. So fi'ii)UMiess and ai^e canic upon them, and 
death diew near, .md o!d\- when his ehill was eieep- 
ini; «)\'ei' tlu-ni, for death was imparl i.il and j^avc 
neither an hour's advant.i|.u- of time, did the hand 
of one was it M.hl;.!! et 's or NancN's? re.ieh ft-e- 
bly out and clasp the (Mitstretchin;^ hand of the 
other, — .1 last sisterly clasp across the dividing lino. 





AN OLD CLOSE IN EDINBURGH Pago 7H 



IV. 



ROSLIN AND IIAWTHORNDEN : MELROSE : THE 
ENCJLISH LAKE REGION. 

Wild louiul the gates the cliisky wall-Howers creep; — 
— Gone is the bower, the grot a ruined heap, 
Where hays and ivy o'er the fragments spread. 

Seven miles from Edinburgh, in the parish of Lass- 
wade and where four roads of the homely little vil- 
lage meet, is the pedestal of an old market-cross 
— the sign of the right to have weekly markets on 
Saturdays and a fair on each October 28th, as 
granted by James II. in 1456. Following one of 
these four roads on a fickle May day, we came to 
as beautiful a valley as graces Scotland, that through 
which the North Esk flows, — the scene in olden 
time of the regal splendor of the " Princely St. 
Clairs," — now notable for the exquisite Chapel built 
by the most princely of this family, that magnificent 
Earl of Rosslyn " whose titles would weary a Span- 
iard," and who maintained an almost regal establish- 
ment where are now but the ruins of Rosslyn Castle. 
If one wishes to moralize over these ruins, he may find 
sufficient text in the contrast between the fortunes 
of the present Earl who has sought to earn a liveli- 
hood by dancing on the public stage, and the mag- 
nificence of the builder of the Chapel, whose carver 
and cup-bearer were noblemen, whose Princess — 

79 



So 



A (loldiii \\'.i\'. 



" .111(1 iiniic iii.ili licil Ik I 111 ,ill I Ih 1 (Hiiil I \' s.ivc llir 
* >ih III'', m.i|. .|\ ■■ \\,i', ,il |,M(|i(l li\ M \ . Ill \' luc 
il.iUi'Jil ri •■ ol iioMiiiicii ,111(1 Iw.i liimdicd i;ciil Iciucil, 
.111(1 lnl(M> wIliMii ,is ;,lu' p.i'.'.fd |() llic I'., Ill'', ic-.i 
'l(ii(. Ill i;i,i( Kli i.ii 's W'n'IuI, III l'.(liiiliiii;;li, ri';lil\' 
ll.imiii;; I du lie. w CI c Ik «i iic. 

I\(IS'.1\ II I'll.lp.l ll.l . ll(( II (Ic'.t I ll)((l .1'. ".Ill nil 

rmishcd lli(Mi;;lil 111 .IdiK ." '■ ll i'. (lie lie, id of .i 
I .ll licdl .ll. Ii> wliull llic 1)(m1\ I1(\(I ;'l(\\," '..iid dill 

;; Hide, .111(1 I ( ( Mild l>iil I liiiiK ( 'I one ol I In cc .-.iii'Mni'' 
lic.id'. ( i| .iii"( I. Ill w liu ll llic iii.i'.l CI '. (i| •..HI cd ,11 1 
h.ivc dclijdilcd. •,(. lull (.1 llic .111(1 li;dil ,md hc.iuh' 
.111(1 l(>\c tli.il one lc( 1'. th.il it I', (diiiplclc. I'lic 

dllC 'Mi.li llldli'dll dl llllll wild (diucivcd i( 
I 1 1,1 1 1 1 •.lidiild lie .1 r>il)lc 111 ■•Idlic ten lilll!; Id .111 nil 
l.tlcicd .I'M- the ll ■.'.oil', dl tlic .'n I 1|>I nic. .Hid d| 
nidl,illl\ 1'. Il.illli (1 lt\ .1 I lldlCllld llldlii'lit'., ;;l,i\c, 
•,|iiiiln.il. |M dl ( '.(iiii , widipdil diit 111 |)ill.ii'. .111(1 
, III lie. .111(1 (oilicl. ; in '.( 1 i|il III .ll .111(1 .illc!;di u .ll 
liiMiic-., ill ;;.ii ;',d\ Ic. .ind di.n'oii-., in llowci'. .iiid 
|dli.i|;i" tlicid'.('. the Minlldw ci , Iciiis. K.iil, 1 1 cloil, 
o.lk Ic.ucs, .111(1 111 .ill I he \ .11 icd ( .11 \in!', : loi cull 
111,111 w.is pel nutted I o 1 1 \' 111'. '.Kill .iiid wciU (Hil 
111', own ( (UK I'ltl idii'. ill " ( nnn\ iK'c dexu'e .ind 
I [ 1 1 , n n t 1 1 1 1 , K ' e II e . 

l?eiMiii in I I |(', .111(1 w idiK'liI 11 1 Id n until I |,'^ |, I lie 
('ll,l|iel llie (lidli dl w ll.il W.K. intended to lie ,i 
!;i e.it ( 'dll( ;M.it e ( liiii i ll \\ .!•. ll.ii dU i (ilil|>lel ed \\ lien 
the {Me. it I'.. Ill (Ik (1 , .ind tlie ine.iiK. ol thei.iniiU 
wiM'i? i>rol>.il>l\' tdd nun ll dimini'.lied loi liis .siu- 
Ci'.ssdi'.s to v(>ni|>l(te the l)nildiii|;. The Kilorm.i" 



Koslin and Havvthornden. 8i 

tion condemned it as " anc house and monument of 
idolatrie, and not ane place apointil; for teiching the 
word aiul ministratioun of ye sacramentis," and the 
Laird was forced in 1592 to demolish its altars. 
In 1650 Cromwell's troupers under General Monk — 
they being engaged in battering down the Castle 
— made the Chapel a stable for their horses. It 
was restored in 1861, and opened for service in the 
year following. 

In the [)oem that first marked his power, The Lay 
of the Last Minstrel, Sicoit has introduced a leg- 
end of the Chapel, — for whenever any evil is to 
come to the " lordly line of high St. Clair," the Chap- 
el is all ablaze with a wondrous light that shines 
even to the Castle. In the ballad that Harold sings, 
Rosabelle, the daughter of the house of Rosslyn, is 
urged to stay in Castle Ravensheuch, and not tempt 
the stormy firth by returning to her father's castle. 
She heeds not the pleading because 

" my ladye-mother there 

Sits lonely in her castle hall," 



and because 



" my sire the wine will chide 

If 'tis not filled by Rosabelle." 

" O'er Roslin all that dreary night 
A wondrous blaze was seen to gleam : 

'Twas broader than the watch-fire's light, 
And redder than the bright moonbeam. 

It glared on Roslin's castled rock. 
It ruddied all the copse-wood glen ; 



82 A (loldcii Way. 

'Twas sfi'ii Ciiini Itiydin's proves of onk, 
Aiul si'in I loin ciMiiicd I lawtlioiiukii. 

" Si'rmcd all (HI liir llial rliapcl imnul 

Wh.ir kosliii's (hi. Is muullmccl lio, — 
I'.ai h liaidii Im a saMi' slinunl 
Shialluil in his iiou [laimply. 

" Sccnu'd all on liir within, around, 

I •(■(■[) sariislv and altai's pale; 

Shone t\ii\' piilai, I'oliagi' iioinid. 

And ulininu lid all tlic dead nun's mail. 

" l^Ia/cd lialtlcmcnl an<l pinnci hii;li, 

I'lla/cd i'\fiv lose raiM'd Imllicss fair — 
So slill tluvlila/f when fair is ni<;h — 
The loidlv line ol hi-h Si, n,iir. 



■' 'I'here aie Iwenh of Koslin's li.iions hold 
1 ie Iniiied wilhin lli.il pioud ehapelle, 
h:,ieli one Ihe holy \,inll .lolh hold — 
I'.ul Ihe se.i hoi. Is lo\ily kos.il., lie, 

" .\lid e.ieh Si. Cl.iir \v,is liniied lliere 

Will. ..mdle and luu.k, .ind wiMi knell ; 
r>nl the st'aeavos nins;, and ihe wild w.ives snug 
The dirj;(' of lovely Kosalielle." 

When Dorulliy W'oidsw orth x'isitod llie Chapel 
in 1803, she \va,s much iniprcssiHl by tlic cxciuisile 
fi)H.iL;c sculplure, " si> (U-Uc, itel\' w r(uit,^ht that I 
couUl aihiiirc it for h(Mirs. and the whole of the 
<j^roinul-\\iM"k stained h\' time with the ,«;oftest ce)lors." 

While she linj^ericl within tlu' walls, a storm eanu- 
up. and her brother, her com pan ion. wrote the sonnet 
beginning 

" Tlie wiiul is now thy organi.st." 




THE 'PRF.NTICE'S PILLAR, ROSSLYN CHAPEL Pago H2 



l\()sliii and I lawihonulcii. 



«3 



After the c-ycs have waiidi red from one desij^ii of 
beauty to another, thi-y come hack to what (h)idjt- 
lessthc)' first souj^hl, the "I'reiilici' rilhii/' -so 
extiuisitt.' ill its (K-si^ii, so pathdit in its stor)\ 
Siieh le-.n-nds, tliey say, are toUl ol olhcr pillars in 
other ihiirehfs and in lai oti hinds. Well, they may- 
be true 1 here, also, (or jealous)' aiu! insensali- ra^'C 
have ollcn urou^hl identical tra<^edies. I'rom a 
base whereon are w roiudil ei<.;lil (Ira<^ons in 1 eit wined, 
rises a eolnnm about w hose- {graceful form four wind- 
ing w real lis of ilowersai'e bound, each si)iiiii;iii^ from 
a drai^oii's nioiil h. 'i'iiese s])iral wreaths terminate 
at tlu' capitol, and on the side of this is a repre- 
sentation of Isaac bound on the altar, and a ram 
caught in the thicket by his horns, the ( )ld 'I'esta- 
meiit story that typilies the sacrifice of ("hiist on 
the- cross. 

While the chapel was in const met ion, t he founder 
sent to the mast er workman a model of a pillar so 
beavitiful in design, so delicate in it s ornamentation, 
that he dared not attempt to sha|)i' it until he had 
seen the orijdnal in the Italian city in which the 
model had l)een drawn. .So he left the model in 
the charge of his ap|)rentice and joiirin \'ed to Italy, 
and there he stayed for months, stiidyiii;.; tlu' jjillar. 
lull he was discouraged, for it did not seem possible 
to him that another colmim of i (pial beauty could 
be \vrou;,dil. When he had lelurned home, his a|)- 
prentice called to him, "Come, see the work that I 
have wrought." And he showed him a |)illar 
wrought after the fashion of the model, but of a 



84 A (iolden Way. 

beauty even greater than that of the one the master 
had studied. And his face was aglow with pride 
anil liis eyes bright w ith expectation of the praise 
that, his master would give him. Hut the master- 
workman was so madikned by jealous rage that he 
seized the mallet antl felled the apiuentice dead. 

Upon the west wall of the Choir may be seen 
the head of the marvelous apprentice, wrought in 
stone, a deep scar above the e)-e showing where the 
blow fell ; nearby is the mournful f.ice of his mother, 
for he was her only son and she a widow ; and op- 
posite, the face of the master-workman ; for such 
memorials did their fellow-workmen carx'e. A pillar 
is also shown as that of the master workman. But 
in the course of years the tooth of time has des- 
troyed the lineaments of the master-workman and 
bitten into the pillar called his, while the head of 
the apprentice and the " Prentice Pillar " have been 
spared from injury. 

By a short path along the tanks of the Esk, we 
came to a bridge across a ravine beyond w liich lay 
the ruins of Rosslyn Castle, pillaged in 1688 by a 
mob who were anxious to destroy the Catholic 
books and images and vestments that it might con- 
tain, and battered di)wu by General Monk two 
years later. Our ringing at the bell did not arouse 
the fair lady or the knight who sleep by enchant- 
ment in the vaidts beneath, but it brought a tall, 
shambling youth from the garden to act as our 
guide. He rehearsed in a very pleasant way the 



Roslin and f lawthorndcn. 85 

history of the castle and tlic fortunes of the family, 
showed us the rooms, the passages, and the cav- 
ernous, mighty-walled basements beneath, and told 
us of the dungeon of " Little Ease," now closed, 
adown the mouth of which prisoners were let by a 
rope, and in which they lived — or died very speed- 
ily — without light from any source, — literally 
"jugged." Somewhere in these vaults sleeps a lady 
of the house of St. Clair, the guardian of a treasure of 
millions, and when some day a knight shall come 
and blow upon an enchanted horn -hidden, also, in 
one of these chambers — the lady will awake, un- 
bar the treasure-room, and the St. Clairs shall be 
once more of magnificent estate. 

From the garden where our guide was left to re- 
sume his work, 1 pointed my camera at the walls of 
Rosslyn, and then walked under the arch of the 
drawbridge Tiiid along the Ksk a little distance to 
the point where General Monk had pointed his guns 
at the same object. But scarcely had we passed 
this point when we forgot the romance and ruin of 
tiie castle in the beauty of the valley through which 
our path led. Between banks, wild and steep, 
clothed with forest trees in all the fresh verdure of 
spring, with blooming flowers carpeting the hills 
and open spaces, we walked, the path demanding so 
much care as took away all sense of tameness, now 
rugged and narrow, now cut from the solid rock, 
now rising far above the stream and again desceiul- 
ing steeply to it, and ever the music of the wind in 
the trees and of the purling water in its course. Along 



86 A Golden Way. 

this way we came to a fence that separated Rosslyn 
Glen from Hawthornden. There a toll permitted 
us to cross a rude bridge beyond which the path at 
first kept the river bank and then ascended, skirting 
the edge of a high and steep precipice. Thence we 
saw the most enchanting views of the little river, and 
tliat rare prospect whicii the poet Moir describes : — 

" fixed in clefts, 



Where gleams at intervals a patch of sward, 
The hazel throws his silvery branches down, 
Fringing with grace the dark-brown battlements. 
Look up, and lo ! o'er all, a castled cliff — 
Its roof is lichened o'er, purple and green, 
And blends its gray walls with coeval trees. 

There Joiisoii sat in DritDiiiioiiifs i lassie shade ; 
The vtazy si ream bcJieath is Kosslyn^s Esk — . 
And 'vhal thou lookest on is llawlhorndeit ! " 

Out of the perpendicular cliff on which the gray 
walls are founded, in some remote age a series of 
caves was cut, — by whom no one knows. These are 
entered from the courtyard of the castle by the 
" King's Gallery," a passage seventy-five feet long 
and scarcely the height of a tall man. From this 
is a side passage leading to a deep well, the water 
in which is twenty-four feet below the floor level of 
the caves and forty-eight below that of the court- 
yard. The " King's Gallery " widens at the farther 
end, and leads by a small entrance to the cave 
called " Bruce's Bedroom," and by another and 
longer passage to " Bruce's Library." The end of 
the "Gallery " is open, looking down the steep sides 




HAWTHORNDEN 



Pago 86 



Roslin and Hawthonidcn. 87 

of the cliff. The sides of the " Library " arc cut into 
a large number of pigeon-holes, possibly for books 
— it was this conjecture that gave the room the des- 
ignation of " Library," — possibly to hold the ashes 
of the dead, and most probably — for both of these 
conjectures seem unreasonable — for some unguessed 
use. Who cut these caves no one dares to say, nor 
is there any authentic information concerning their 
use, but doubtless they were places of refuge and 
concealment in the times when no man's life was 
safe against his neighbor, and men, like beasts of 
dread, were alternately the hunters and the hunted. 
The attendant showed us the relics kept in the 
mansion, — a silk dress and shoes once worn by Queen 
Mary, the tartan coat of Bonnie Prince Charlie, 
some old tables, and furniture — the gifts of royalty 
to the heads of the house, — and the collection of in- 
teresting portraits. Our warmest interest, however, 
was in the classic shades of the great sycamore, in 
the grounds, called the Four Sisters or the CompcDiy 
Tree. For under this tree the poet Drummond sat 
and was visited by the Muses. And on one day as 
he sat here, there came to him another favored of 
the Muses, also, — " rare Ben Jonson," travel-stained 
by his long pedestrian tour from London. 

" Welcome, welcome, royal ]>cii ! " 

Cried Drummond, to which Jonson replied by 
completing the rhyme, 

"Thank ye, thank yc, irawlhornden ! " 

After a winter spent in luiinburgh, Jonson re- 



88 A Golden Way. 

turned to Hawthornden and spent three weeks in the 
month of April, 1619, in most intimate confidence 
with his brother poet. To Drummond beneath this 
very tree, or in the shades of the woods below the 
castle, Jonson spoke with the utmost freedom of 
the authors of the time, Shakespeare — dead two 
years before — Sidney, Spenser, Drayton, and a host 
of others, and these frank criticisms his host and 
friend wrote in a note-book and published with most 
severe comments on the personality of his guest, in 
a volume called Heads of Certain Conversations. 
" The evil that men do lives after them ; the good 
is oft interred with their bones : " therefore Drum- 
mond's Heads of Certain Conversations have lived to 
vex the memory of Jonson, while his stilted and 
artificial Tears on the Death of MeliadesWes forgot- 
ten in the dust. 

The fickle day that had shone on and shaded our 
way through scenes of such romance and ruin and 
charm of wood and cliff and stream, let loose at last 
a pattering shower, and we walked down the long 
avenue that leads from Hawthornden to the music 
of the rain among the trees. When we reached the 
highway the blue sky stole forth from the clouds, 
and the sun bathed in soft glory the close of the long, 
interesting day. 

When the golden way led us to Melrose we hap- 
pily selected as our hotel " The Abbey," — close to 
the ruins of the famous Abbey of St. Mary of Mel- 
rose, and, indeed, forming the western boundary of 



Roslin and Hawthornden. 89 

its churchyard. The inn itself was charming and 
quaint, full of rich pictures, rare curios, and glean- 
ings from many lands, and arranged with a delight- 
ful coffee-room where we were furnished a delicious 
lunch with furnishings of spotless napery, old silver, 
and beautiful china. Then when we were given our 
choice of bedrooms, and I had found one looking 
straight into the nave of the Abbey and to the east 
oriel, my cup of content was full. For a week we 
had lived in daily companionship with the monument 
to Sir Walter Scott in Edinburgh, in designing 
which the artist had fittingly taken all the details 
from Melrose Abbey, and now for a day and a night 
— and the moon was to be at its full — we were to be 
closest neighbors to this beautiful ruin. 

The grass was green upon the top of its walls, 
and the little light-hearted birds were resting and 
nesting there. In the churchyard an old man was 
cutting the grass, and as he bent over with his scythe 
in his hand, gray-bearded, he seemed the representa- 
tion of Father Time v/ho had garnered many a har- 
vest there. Within this yard there are many inter- 
esting monuments. On one 1 found the beautiful' 
inscription, — 

" The earth goes on the earth 

Glistering Hke gold ; 
The earth goes to the earth 

Sooner than it wold ; 
The earth builds on the earth 

Castles and towers ; 
The earth says to the earth, 

'AW shall be ours.' " 



go A Golden Way. 

On the tomb of Sir David Brewster, the scholar 
whose studies were mainly on the subject of light, 
is the sentient inscription, "The Lord is my 
light." Within the ruins rests the heart of King 
Robert Bruce, — that heart which beat with love 
for this edifice, and which, pulsing no more, was by 
his request sent to Palestine. His friends, however, 
brought it back before it had reached the intended 
city. 

There is an old Latin couplet that characterizes 
the localities chosen by the religious bodies : 

Bernardus valles, colles Benedkius, 

Oppida Frattciscus, viagnas Ignatius urbes. 

So the Cistercians, whose great Saint was Ber- 
nard, chose the gentle valley of Melrose, close to 
the waters of the Tweed, wherein to build an 
Abbey. This same order was the builder of Foun- 
tains, Furness, Tintern, and other abbeys in Eng- 
land, the glory and magnificence of which their 
ruins still attest. These monks were tillers of the 
ground rather than spiritual guides. They lived in 
seclusion, the gardens blossoming and growing fruit- 
ful under their care, and the cloisters shielding them 
in their exercises and recreation. Where once they 
tilled I found the sweet wall-flower blooming, and 
from the little mistress of the garden I obtained 
some seed to grow and bloom in a country that 
these monks of old knew not of. 

The Abbey was founded in 1136 by David L 
King of Scotland, for this gentle order, but, although 



Roslin and Hawthornden. 91 

John Morow, the master-workman, prayed~as his 
tablet in the south transept declares — 

" to God and Mari baith 



And sweet Sancte John to keep 
this holy kirk fra skaith," 

Richard II, in 1385, and Henry VIII, in 1545, 
each wrecked it, and after this last scathe-fire it was 
rebuilt no more. In 1649 ^^^ Covenanters destroyed 
the images which filled the richly carved niches of 
its walls. Then it was used as a quarry for stones, 
just as the magnificent ruined Abbey of Glaston- 
bury, in England, was, — and its exquisitely wrought 
stones went for the building of houses and mills 
and bridges, in whose walls their incongruous beauty 
is still seen. The ruins were little known, little 
cared for, and little visited, until Scott, in 1805, 
gave them fame by his descriptions in T/ie Last 
Minstrel. Since the story of Deloraine's quest was 
told, more thousands than we dare to name have 
visited Melrose to gaze on this noble ruin, — the 
poet's pictures turning to visions real in roof and 
pillar and oriel. 

THE CLOISTERS. 

Now, slow and faint, he led the way 

Where, cloistered round, the garden lay; 

The pillared arches were over their head. 

And beneath their feet were the bones of the dead. 

Spreading herbs and flowrets bright 

Glistened with the dew of night ; 

Nor herb nor flowret glistened there, 

But was carved in the cloister arches as fair. 



92 A Golden Way. 

THE CHANCEL. 

By a steel-clenched postern door 

They entered now the chancel tall ; 
The darkened roof rose high aloof 

On pillars lofty and light and small ; 
The keystone that locked each ribbed aisle 
Was a fleur-de-lis, or a quatre-feuille ; 
The corbels were carved grotesque and grim ; 
And the pillars with clustered shafts so trim, 
With base and with capital flourished round, 
Seemed bundles of lances which garlands had bound. 

THE EAST ORIEL. 

The moon on the east oriel shone 
Through slender shafts of shapely stone 

By foliaged tracery combined ; 
Thou would'st have thought some fairy's yart^ 
'Twixt poplars straight the osier wand 

In many a freakish knot had twined ; 
Then framed a spell, when the work was done, 
And changed the willow wreaths to stone. 

Despite our well-laid scheme to see fair Melrose 
by the pale moonlight, a rain set in just at evening, 
and the sky was clouded all the night. If matters 
had been arranged for just such nights as they were 
in " little, honest Johnny Bower's " time, the loss 
would have had its compensations, for tliat guide of 
earlier years had learned a lesson from Quince, and 
used to replace the moon by a great candle on a 
long pole. " It does na' light up the" abbey all at 
aince," he would explain, " but then you can shift it 
aboot, and show the auld ruin bit by bit, whiles 
the moon herself only shines on one side." 



Roslin and Hawthornden. 93 

To "little, honest Johnny Bower" every part and 
line of Scott's poems and romances were but the 
unvarnished truth. From Scott's description he 
located the exact place of the grave of the wizard, 
Michael Scott. He knew everything and a great 
deal more about the ruins, but he always deferred 
to Scott when the romancist brought visitors to the 
Abbey. " What needs I say any mair about it?" 
he would ask. " There's the Captain kens mair 
anent it than I do, or any man in the town." 

We took a sunset walk, following a narrow path 
that began along the south wall of the churchyard, 
and led through fields and by wooded banks and 
near a rippling stream, and unexpectedly came out 
into a village of a single street, narrow, twisted, and 
bordered by old cottages with the marks of Time's 
ravages on them^Ncwstead, marking the site of an 
old Roman colony. In its vicinity numerous Roman 
remains have been found, coins and vases, an under- 
ground saccllum and altars. Here, too, so we were 
told, the workmen who built the great Abbey lived, 
but later the village of Melrose grew up nearer the 
abode of the Cistercians. 

Out from Melrose and three miles away our will- 
ing feet carried us to Abbotsford, the air full of the 
sweetness of May, our cheeks moistened with some 
drifting Scotch mist, our expectant hearts trium- 
phant over any sense of fatigue or discomfort. I had 
expected to approach this home of Scott, seeing it 
afar off and gradually gaining a sense of nearness 



94 A Cioklcn Way. 

to it, but I found it scchulctl (von\ such an ailvcnt. 
A guide in the road thicctcd us to a gate on the 
riglit, whicli athuiltcd us to a well-guarded path, the 
end of w hieh was a postern gate admitting us to the 
basement. Here in a room where various pictorial 
mementoes are exposed for sale, the guide met us, 
took our shillings antl gave us in exchange a card — - 
which we tlropped in a locked box, — and then showeil 
us mechanically, unsympathetically, and rapidlx' 
through the wirious rooms open to the public. We 
were shown through Rosslyn Chapel by a guide 
who knew and loved every stone of it, to whom our 
delight in arch or car\'ing was a great pleasure, and 
who took as a personal compliment an\' desire to 
linger in admiration at any spot within those gU)rious 
walls. In other places open for a fee )'ou are rarely 
made to feel the financial obligation. The shilling 
slii)s quietly and unobtrusively into a veh'el palm. 
lUit here it was obtrusive; you could hear it jingle 
into the ct^ffers of the lairil in residence, and 
the sound jarnxl upon the associations of the 
place. 

C^ut of the confusion c)f so hast)' a walk, " for a 
shilling," through the treasures of Abbotsford, some 
few rememberetl things arc very vivid. Hawthorne 
s[)eaks of the old room in which he wrt>ught his 
earlier work as a " haunted chamber; (ov thousands 
upon thousamls of visions have appeared to me in 
it, and some few have become visible to the world." 
And about the desk and " his own luigc elbow 
chair," of the great Scotch romancist and poet, what 



Roslin and Hawthonulcn, 95 

shadowy forms have crowded ! What scenes the 
wondrous eye of his brain saw there enacted, when 
confines of wall and time were swept away, and he 
beheld all the scenes and actions of the Waverley 
romances, while their characters thronged him ! 
On this massive table, this richly carved and crimson- 
lined old box, for more than twenty years his pen 
transmitted to immortality the romances which the 
subtle alchemy of his brain wrought from the his- 
tory, the legentls, and the poesy, with which his 
mind was stored. And when on the evening of his 
burial— September 26, 1832 — they looked there for 
his testament, they found " a little series of ol)jects " 
which had obviously been so placed that his eye 
might rest on them every morning Ijcfore he began 
his tasks. These were the old-fashionetl boxes that 
had garnished his mother's toilet when he, a sickly 
chiltl, slei)t in her dressing-room, the silver taper- 
stand which the young advocate had bought for her 
with his first five-guinea fee, a row of small i)ackets 
inscribed with her hand, and containing the hair of 
those of her offspring that had died before her, 
his father's snuff-box and etui case, — and more 
things of the same sort, recalling 

"The old familiar faces. " 

For the clothes of Sir Walter — the dark-green 
broadcloth coat, the fawn-colored beaver hat— I 
cared little. 1 1 has always seemed to me vulgar — 
other men, other tastes — to exhibit the wearing 
iipparel of the dead, and 1 would rather picture 



96 A Golden Way. 

Scott as Iivint^ saw him than in these garments. 
" His dress was simple and almost rustic," said 
Irving. "An old green slu)oting-jacket, with a dog- 
whistle at the buttonhole, brown linen pantaloons, 
stout shoes that tied at the ankle, and a white hat 
that had evidentl)' seen some service ; " although at 
dinner, Irving adds, " he laid aside his half-rustic 
garb and api)eared soberly clad in black." 

The dining-room was his last chamber, arranged 
that he might enjoy the views from the window and 
the sounds that floated in. It was to this room 
that he calletl his son-in-law, Lockhart, and bade 
him " Be a good man — be virtuous, be religious, be 
a good man. Nothing else will give you any com- 
fort when you come to lie here,"- — words that re- 
call what he s.iid, )'ears before, about the education 
of his sons : " I am not over-bent upon making prod- 
igies of my boys. I have taught them to ride and 
to spCixk tlii truth.'' Here, surrounded by his chil- 
dren, with the September breezes blowing in at the 
window, and the sound that he lovetl — the gentle 
ripple of the river Tweed — falling soothingly upon 
his ear, he passed through slumber to death. 

The house is bewilderingly rich in articles which 
wouKl ruin with jealousy the soul of an anticpiary, — 
the sword of Montrose, the gun of Rob Ro}- — Sir 
Walter thought that a dialogue between these 
articles would be effective, — the pistols of Napoleon 
and his pen-case and blotting-book, tlie seal of Queen 
INTary, ami that silver cross which was her com- 
fort and sl.iy on her way to the headsman's block, 



Kosliii and llawUiuriKlcu. 97 

Prince Charlie's quaigh, — pathetic memento ! and a 
thousand other things. 

Wlien we returned to the entrance, a little lad in 
Scotch kilt was playing and babbling there, the 
youngest son of the gifted Lady Maxwell-Scott, the 
chatelaine of the house, herself the granddaughter 
of Lockhart and Sophia Scott, and the great grand- 
daughter of the romancist. It was the sunny face 
of this youngest of the house of Scott that smiled 
into ours as we turned away from the door, his gen- 
tle hand that was outstretched to ours in parting. 

There was an abundance of time on the walk back, 
to recall the history of the house whose every stone 
was dear to the heart of Scott, and whose com- 
pletion in 1825 was contemporaneous with the dis- 
aster to his fortunes. To the building which he had 
reared with so much pride and joy, his last years 
add a new glory, because he made it the monument 
of an integrity that was flawless, the memorial of a 
victory that sapped his life but left it crowned with 
glory. The battle waged, the victory gained, the 
house — "an air castle," so he called it, "turned to 
solid stone and mortar " — saved for the generations 
that were to come after him, in serenity he could say, 

" \Voii is the glory, and tlie grief is past." 

Through the Border Land, past Nethcrby Hall 
and Canobie, — the scenes of the romantic adventure 
of young Lochinvar, — we passed out from Scotland 
into I*>ngland. In the first village beyond the bor- 
der we saw coming down the country road a gay pro- 
7 



98 A Golden Way. 

cession of children, with banners flying, barehead- 
ed and clad for the warmth of a summer day. In 
a field near by a tent had been erected and prepara- 
tions made for an out-of-doors picnic. The sky 
seemed as bright as the faces of the children, and 
the sunshine, as light as their hearts, lay upon the 
freshest of foliage and verdure. But suddenly upon 
all this joy and gaiety there swept a cloud, the 
heavens opened, the floods descended, ranks were 
broken in a universal scurrying for places of shelter 
— and the train swept on leaving the sequel to our 
imaginations. Along the way great masses of 
yellow columbine made sunshine on the banks, and 
along the lighter green of the fields and hillsides 
stretched dark green hedges like dividing threads. 
The train was full of Whitsun week excursionists, 
and when we stopped at Keswick, they went laugh- 
ing and jovial adown the street to a beautiful park 
that was to be the scene of their games and further 
merriment. Skidd'aw was veiled, but now and again 
the clouds would float down from his sides to shower 
their moisture upon the pleasure-seekers, and then 
the mountain would look forth, bright and smiling, 
upon the mischief of the shower. This little town 
where Southey lived forty years, the place of the 
Falls of Ladore to which his verses have given un- 
deserved fame, the parish of Crosthwaite Church in 
whose yard he lies buried, abounds in beautiful views 
of mountains and lakes above and beyond, and in 
crooked streets and sudden turns and steep de- 
scents below and near at hand. 



Ruslin and Hawthorndcn. 99 

The Falls of Ladore were familiar to me from my 
earliest school days when the jinti^ling verses describ- 
ing them were a daily exercise in the pronunciation 
of i)ig. I had seen pictures of them, too, exulting and 
leaping, but the story of witty Dean Hole had swept 
away all delusions born of the poem. In their beau- 
tiful setting of tall and wooded crags, they remind- 
ed me of some of the water courses in the White 
Mountains which the local people call dry brooks — 
brooks that are beautiful, rushing, rippling cascades 
of water after the rains have fallen on the mountain 
sides, but at other times but ragged beds of stone, 
with the faintest rivulets trickling in them. 

Greta Hall, where Southey went to live with 
Coleridge after the death of his first-born, stands on 
a little hill above the river that gives it its name and 
sends its murmuring music across the orchard and 
the garden. In front lies that "giant's camp — an 
encamped army of tent-like mountains," as Cole- 
ridge describes it, " which by an inverted arch gives 
a view of another vale." Skiddaw lies behind it, 
the vale and lake of Bassenthwaite on the right, and 
Uerwentwater — the loveliest of all the English lakes 
— full in view on the left. 

The rambling tenement- — " two houses under one 
roof" — with its study, which was also the drawing- 
room, its passages lined with books, the dark api)le- 
room where a boii'/c lived, is peopled to-day with in- 
corporeal forms ; Southey, as solitary as Hawthorne, 
but full of a sweet and sunny temper in his own 
home circle, Mrs. Southey, bearing the family 

L.ofC. 



100 A Golden Way. 

cares, the Coleridges, and, quaintest of all creatures, 
Hartley, — " The pity is," says he, " I'm always 
thinking of my thoughts," — and the guests who 
came and went, still dwell within these homely walls, 
and walk the familiar wa\-s ; — and though the night- 
ingale and the violet— " the most delightful bird and 
the sweetest flower," — so missed by Southey, flour- 
ish not in these more northern vales, there are songs 
that compensate and odors fragrant and subtle, — 
the memories of those who have made a simple cot- 
tage a shrine, and given to the beauties of nature 
"the consecration and the Poet's dream." 

It is told that when death had come to the sad- 
dened Southey, whose mind had become a child's 
mind, and in the churchyard of Crossthwaite Church 
his ashes were returned to ashes, at the words " dust 
to dust, the sure and certain hope of the Resurrec- 
tion," the wind became hushed, the rain ceased, the 
gloomy clouds parted, and from the rift a glory of 
sunshine lay upon the grave, while a chorus of birds 
broke the silence with a gladsome song. 

Although Skiddaw still threatened showers when 
we started on the fifteen-mile coach ride to Gras- 
mere, it was but a frown that changed to a smile. 
The weather became beautiful and added an autumn 
charm of clearness to the most delightful ride in this 
most romantic country. The road is through the 
heart of a vallc}'', not level, but crossing ridges and 
descending between protecting cliffs and banks. 
A mile from Keswick we cross Castle Rigg, and, 



Rosliii and Hawthorndcn. loi 

three miles farther, the Castle Rock of St. John rises 

on tlie left, 

" With battled walls and buttress fast, 
And barbicon and ballium vast, 
And airy flanking towers, that cast 
Their shadow on the stream." 

Soon the mighty Helvellyn appears, and the road 
along its base skirts lake Thirlmere. Beyond we pass 
a cairn of stones, said to mark the grave of Dunmail, 
the last king of Cambria, and then we descend the 
long slope of Dunmail Raise Pass and come to 
Grasmere. Here the charm of lake and mountain 
are subordinated to that of association, for here 
lived Wordsworth during the earlier years of man- 
hood, and here he rests. 

The little inclosure in the southeast corner of this 
" God's Acre among the mountains" holds precious 
dust, for the simple inscription, " William Words- 
worth, 1850," marks the grave of him whom many 
think the greatest of the laurel-crowned English 
poets, and the stone marked, " Dorothy Words- 
worth, 1855," rests lightly above the most devoted of 
sisters. Here, too, among others of that household, 
lies the dear wife who inspired the poet's tributes, 
" She was a phantom of delight," " Yes, thou art 
fair," " Let other bards of angels sing," and " Lines 
written after Thirty-Six Years of Wedded Life," — 
that wedded life whose 

" Morn into noon did pass, noon into eve, 
And the old day was welcome as the young, 
As welcome, and as beautiful, — in sooth 
More beautiful, as being a thing more holy." 



102 A Golden Way. 

Very near is Dove Cottage, — once an inn called 
" The Dove and Olive Bough," — where Wordsworth 
and liis sister set up tlicir household goods and 
gods in 1800. By the generous efforts of Professor 
Knight of St. Andrews, the cottage, with numerous 
portraits, letters, and manuscripts, has been pre- 
sented to the British Nation, and will, therefore, 
remain in much the same form as when Wordsworth 
occupied it. The parlor below, which was some- 
times sitting-room, sometimes lodging-room and 
sometimes kitchen, the scene of much high think- 
ing and plain living, looks as it did when Dc Quincey 
described it in 1807: — "An oblong square, not 
above eight and a half feet high, sixteen feet long, 
and twelve broad, very prettily wainscoted with 
dark polished oak, slightly embellished with carv- 
ing. One window there was — a perfect and unpre- 
tending cottage window with little diamond panes — 
embowered at almost every season of the year with 
a profusion of jasmine and other shrubs." 

Dorothy Wordsworth often laughed when think- 
ing of the young Scotch lawyer who came to break- 
fast there one morning. Busy with other cares, she 
put the toasting-fork into his hands that he might 
brown the bread over the fire. The smell of burn- 
ing bread recalled her to this room, where she found 
the guest absorbed in a book that he had drawn 
from the shelves near by, but still holdingthecinders 
of the bread over the consuming flames. Back of 
the stone cottage is the plot of orchard ground with 
the spring whose stones were laid by the poet. 



Roslin and Hawtliorndcn. 103 

Here arc the steps leading to a terraced walk and 
a space of mountain ground hedged in by fir-trees, 
and, farther back, heights climbing heights to Helm 
Crag. The primrose and the daisy still bloom in 
their accustomed places, and I heard the call of 
the cuckoo, just as Dorothy Wordsworth had so 
many years ago. After the Wordsworths had gone 
three miles away to Rydal Mount, Do Quincey 
came here and dreamed the dreams of the Opium 
Eater. Here, in those days of simple tastes, Southey 
was a guest, and Coleridge, and Humphrey Davy ; 
and Walter Scott antl his wife slept in one of the 
dove-cote chambers. 

From Grasmcrc the road passes Nab Cottage, the 
home for many years of Hartley Coleridge, and 
soon after the high stone seat, overlooking the lake, 
where Wordsworth loved to sit in pensiveness. At 
Rydal is Rydal Mount, the home of the poet for 
thirty-three years— now an estate kept strictly pri- 
vate. 

In the mile that stretches from Rydal to Am- 
bleside we catch glimpses of fair and historical 
estates. Fox How, the home of Dr. Arnold and of 
his gifted granddaughter, Mrs. Ward, the Knoll, 
the home of Harriet Martineau, — and then with a 
whirl we come into Ambleside, a union of the old 
and the new, old houses and new edifices, old, crooked 
and interesting roads, and new straight and unin- 
teresting streets. 

Our hostelry was the Salutation Inn, — a place 
of entertainment for man and beast since 1656, — 



104 A Golden Way. 

delightful in its service, the agreeableness of its 
guests, and the old-time taste of its furnishings. 
The chamber assigned to me was almost large 
enough for a small house of parliament, and the 
bed in which I slept was full six feet wide, with a 
red canopy and curtains hung from posts that rose 
surely ten feet, with a flight of steps up which to 
mount and thence fling one's self into downy depths. 
What wonder that I dreamed that I was sleeping 
in a scarlet howdah that rested on the back of an 
enormous elephant ! 

From Ambleside a hundred paths lead each to 
a more entrancing goal than any other, but the 
golden xvay was straightly drawn to London, now, 
and so we walked the mile of distance between the 
inn and Lake Windermere in continuance of the 
journey. A quaint sign on the engine house at 
Windermere is worthy of being preserved in these 
days of haste: — "In case of fire please ring the 
bell at Mechanics Institute" — the institute is fully 
half a mile away, — " and call the Captain and Sur- 
veyor." 

The showers fall easily in these beautiful lake 
regions, and we traversed half the length of Lake 
Windermere with a mist of rain now hiding and now 
softly half-revealing the banks. Near one of the 
landing-places a white cross rose out of the water, 
marking the place where two young men were 
drowned. When the rain ceased and the mists of 
the air were gathered up into fleecy clouds, floating 
in the soft blue of the sky, the rippling surface of 



Roslin and Hawthornden. 



105 



the lake, the dripping leaves of the trees jeweled 
with golden light, the mountains threaded with 
silver water-courses, stones and crags and masses of 
gorse adding their color, the glory that the sky hung 
over and the hills encompassed seemed the soul of 
Nature speaking to the soul of man of Him whose 
handiwork it is. 




V. 



IN AND OUT OF LONDON. 

— London, the buskined stage 
Of history, the archive of the past, — 
The heart, the centre of the living world I 

When I flung open my window in the morning, 
and the i^reat roar of the city fell upon my ears, it 
thrilled nie deepl}-. We were within the very courts 
of London — London which has felt every throb of 
the heart of English history and literature and life, 
— so immense that no man can know it, so familiar 
that no man comes as a stranger to it. 

Every walk that we took brought back a thousand 

memories of what we had read ; every street into 

which we strayed was tenanted by those whom we 

had met in books,- or the scene of actions which the 

pen of the historian or novelist had written down, 

and in four weeks we lived through eight hundred 

and more years of English life. Out of crowded 

days I select a few hours whose record has to me a 

personal interest, and yet the things of which T 

make no note, the Tower, the Abbey, the boating 

on the Thames, — how long the list might be ! — are 

omitted only because so many others have told of 

them so well. Little excursions took us away from 

London for a day or two, but we came back to it as. 

to the old home. 
io5 




SHAKESPEARE'S BIRTHPLACE Page 106 



In and Out of London. 107 

Four out of every five Kiiglislimen whom you 
meet will tell you the anecdote of the American 
who "hoped he shouldn't walk in his sleep, because 
he might step off the blamed little island," — " You 
are so very big over there, don't you know," they 
will add, — and ninety-nine out of a hundred will 
ask you, " You have been to — ah — Stratford, of 
course?" "It is an unwritten law," I made answer, 
" that no American shall return from England un- 
less he can present a certificate that he has visited 
the birthplace of the myriad-minded dramatist." 
These certificates, by the way, are presented by 
the custodian of the house in Henley Street. The 
golden zvay, therefore, led us to the banks of the 
Avon. However proficient the children of Belfast 
— or any other place — may be in the use of sacred 
and profane language, — "Children," said the lec- 
turer, " that can neither speak nor walk, go about 
the streets, cursing their Maker," — the tongues of the 
youngest children of Stratford would rival them 
in precocity. Toddling infants meet you on every 
street, offer to be your guide, counselor and friend 
in this Shakespeare country, and r'jll off the dates 
and events in the history of the dramatist with 
such volubility and exactness, that you can ex- 
plain it only on the theory of heredity — an action 
constantly repeated by the ancestors has left in 
the descendants a facility that is instinctive. But 
without guide or cicerone it all seemed strangely 
familiar. 

One recognizes at once the timbered cottage in 



io8 A Golden Way. 

Henley Street where John Shakespeare resided 
when his illustrious son was born. Of this triple 
cottage the middle part is the Birthplace. That at 
the right of it was originally the elder Shake- 
speare's place of business, where he dealt in wool 
and gloves. Later it was the inn called the Suurn 
and MaidciiJicad. It is now a nuiscuni containing 
rare copies of the poet's works, memorials of him, 
and the valuable records of the town. The yard 
and orchard back of the house have been made 
a garden where every flower mentioned in Shake- 
speare's works has, so far as possible, been planted. 

While yet the dew lay on the flowers here, I 
thrust the lens of my camera through the bars of 
the gate and captured them all, — and every flower 
was laden with bloom and all the air in the deli- 
cious early morning was sweet with odors moregrate- 
ful than those of Arabia, — for could I not hear poor 
Ophelia, who turned everything " to favor and to 
•prettiness," saying, — 

" There's rosemary, that's for remembrance ; 
pray you, love, remember : and there's pansies, that's 
for thoughts." 

There is a beautifully carved and gabled house 
in High Street that was once the home of the father 
and mother of John Harvard. At the corner of 
High and Bridge Streets is the house where Judith, 
the youngest daughter of Shakespeare, spent the 
thirty and six years of her wedded life. On Church 
Street is the Guild Hall and Guild Chapel and the 
old Grammar School, still a font of learning to a 



In and Out of London. 109 

bright-faced and gcntlc-manncrcd set of youths who 
played cricket on the banks of the Avon when the 
lessons of the day were over. The spire that rises 
beside the sliining Avon can be none other than that 
of Holy Trinity, within whose walls the poet's 
bones lie buried. 

It is only association that makes the walk to Shot- 
tery interesting— the path is so dull and monoto- 
nous, — but the little collection of old timbered houses 
that makes the village of Shottery is as quaint as all 
England can furnish. Then when Shottery brook 
has been crossed, and the Anne Hathaway cottage 
meets your gaze, your fondest expectation of its 
beauty is fulfilled. The flowers of the garden crowd 
up to the very walk, the vines clamber to the 
thatched roof, and every line of the structure is a de- 
light to the eye. It wears not the stains and scars but 
the gentleness of age. I think of some sweet-faced 
old lady, cap-crowned and gentle-hearted, enjoying 
amid the flowers the calm and peacefulness of ripened 
years. 

Between Trinity Church and Clopton Bridge the 
Avon is most beautiful. On one side are the houses 
and estates of old Stratford, on the other a grazing 
ground for gentle cattle and happy horses. Boat- 
ing parties pull back and forth on its placid waters, 
ambitious oarsmen spin along in delicate shells, and 
on the cricket grounds young England plays cricket 
with delightful spirit. 

We sat in the park near the Memorial Theater, 
watching the boys of the Grammar School at their 



no A Golden Way. 

sports across the river, and following the swans as 
they floated back and forth, and then we wandered 
up the Warwick road — one of the most beautifvd in 
England. The day departed reluctantly as we came 
back to Stratford, and through the lingering twilight 
the cuckoo uttered ofttimes his two-noted call. 

In Trinity Church there is a memorial window— 
the gift of Americans in recognition of what Strat- 
ford has given to all the English-speaking people. 
It represents America and England joining in wor- 
ship of tin; Lord Jesus Christ. In all England we 
had found such kindly welcome, such friendliness, 
that it was a great pleasure to see this window — a 
pledge of amity and brotherhood — in Shakespeare's 
church. And there came to us the words of the old 
song which men sung together in Shakespeare's 
time : 

"Then here's a health to all kind hearts 
Wherever they may l)e ; 
For kindly hearts make but one kin 
Of all humanity. 

"And here's a rouse to all kind hearts 
Wherever they be found ; 
For it is the throb of kindred hearts 
Doth make the world go round." 

On our way back to London we stopped for a 
brief hour at Oxford, and saw the windows that look 
on the great quadrangles all abloom with gardens of 
scarlet geraniums and white marguerites and blue 
lobelias. " Those were Gladstone's rooms," said our 
guide, " and only a short time before he died his 



In and Out of London. iii 

thoughts turned with love to this quiet spot, and 
he asked for a photograph of it." As we stood in 
the chapel of Christ College, admiring the window 
designed by Burne Jones, we were told of his death 
that very day. The college year was drawing to 
its close, and the sports were absorbing the atten- 
tion of the students. Across the quadrangles and 
along the cloistered walks we saw young Apollos 
and Herculeses strolling in boating costumes that 
revealed the sturdy frames and swelling muscles of 
the strength of England. In the dining hall the por- 
traits of those who have gone forth from the college 
to gain fame and honor and make England great, look 
down upon the young men who daily assemble 
there, — an inspiration and incentive to those who are 
the hope and strength of the England of to-morrow. 
From Oxford the journey was a constant revela- 
tion of English rural life and out-of-doors pleasures. 
There were canals along which the narrow boats 
were drawn by plodding old horses, hay-fields in 
which the men and women together were busy in 
raking and loading the fragrant dried grass, fields 
of yellow grain, banks on which great patches of 
scarlet poppies faced the sun, and ever and anon 
vistas of the beautiful Thames, winding along 
through scenes of gentle beauty. On its banks were 
picnic parties, and on its bosom boating excursions. 
There were marquees in its meadows and pleasure- 
gatherings on the lawns that stretched down to it. 
The air was clear, the sky blue with softly floating 
clouds, and throughout all Nature's kingdom the 



112 A Golden Way. 

sweetness and content of Arcady. But when we 
came into the crowded and confined ways of Lon- 
don, with the smoke hiding the glory of heaven, the 
streets repulsive with dirt, sodden-faced women, 
drunken and quarreling, and men and children with 
the mark of lifelong wretchedness in their faces, it 
was like passing from some earthly paradise into 
the region where the beast crouchcth and the ser- 
pent lieth in wait and poisoneth. 

It was on our way to Windsor that we left the 
railway at Slough to visit the " Country Church- 
yard " of Stoke-Pogis. The walk led us at first 
through a village street ; then it passed a stile into 
a field through whose rich verdure lay the hard- 
beaten path that we followed. The flowers were turn- 
ing their faces to tlie June sun, the hawthorns were 
scenting the air, everywhere there was the sweet- 
ness and peace of the country, while the larks, soar- 
ing towards the empyrean, sent down on the way 
their rippling melody. The lark's song is ever en- 
chanting. 

" He rises and begins his round, 
He drops tlie silver chain of sound, 
Of many linlvs, without a brealv. 
In chirrup, whistle, slur and shake. 
All intervolved and spreading wide, 
" Like water dimples dowii a tide 

Where ripfle ripple overcttrls 
And eddy into eddy whirls ; 
A press of hurried notes that run 
So fleet they scarce are more than one." 



In and Out of London. 113 

The end of this mclody-liaunted field-path brought 
us to a country road, and on tlie other side of this, 
high on a bank, the mausoleum to the memory of 
Gray told us of our nearness to the scenes that he 
immortalized. 

The front of this monument bears this inscrip- 
tion : "This monument in honor of Thomas Gray 
was erected A. I). 1799, among the scenes celebrated 
by that great lyric and elegaic poet. He died July 
30, 1 77 1, and lies interred in the churchyard ad- 
joining, under the tombstone on which he piously 
and pathetically recorded the interment of his aunt 
and lamented mother." The other inscriptions are 
fitting quotations from the Elegy and the Ode on a 
Distant Prospect of Eton College. 

From this memorial to the memory of the poet, 
it is a short walk to the confines of the church- 
yard whose graves, thick set, outnumber many 
times the living of the parish. Here were the ivy- 
mantled tower, the rugged elms, the yew-tree's shade, 
shielding the mold'ring turf of many a mound be- 
neath it, the tomb of the poet with his inscription 
to the memory of his inother and aunt who also sleep 
there, and many a stone from which time had erased 
the inscription, — possibly some village Hampden's or 
some Cromwell's, " guiltless of his country's blood." 
Over the confining wall a herd of deer were cropping 
the greensward, and in the yard a group of workmen, 
engaged in repairs upon the church, were taking 
their noontide rest, stretched upon the slabs or mak- 
ing them tables for their luncheons. The church 



114 A Golden Way. 

is secluded from the road. It must be reached by 
a quiet path, and, so shut in, so ivy-grown, so sur- 
rounded by the memorials of mortality, so peaceful, 
it is the most fitting scene imaginable for such a 
poem. 

Burnham Beeches, lying not far away, are likewise 
fitly the scene of peace and C()ntcm[)lation,— for 
here are the moss-covered bolls, the wide-spreading 
branches, a little rill that sings and glides away, — 
a haunt for poet or artist. The monarch beech that 
is pointed out as Gray's wonted resting-place, his 
favorite tree, "wreathing its old fantastic roots so 
high," is at least seven centuries old. The " upland 
lawn," which his dew-dampened feet sought "to 
meet the sun," is Burnham Common. 

Next to Stratford-on-Avon, this shrine of Thomas 
Gray was the one to which my way most gladly led. 
And here, where he had sat in contemplation, I 
mused over the memory of his life, and the history 
of the poem. Gray, like Chaucer, Ben Jonson, and 
Milton, was of London birth. His father, Philip 
Gray, a money-broker, had inherited from his father 
ten thousand pounds, and he married when nearly 
thirty years of age Dorothy Antrobus, who, although 
of good family, kept a milliner's shop with her sister. 
Philip Gray was a man of violent, jealous disposi- 
tion, — doubtless half-matl. Extravagant in all self- 
ish expenditures, he was miserly towards his wife 
and family. The wife, however, gave to her family 
what her husband denied, not only the purest and 
most self-denying affection, but the means for their 



In and Out of London. 115 

subsistence. During thirty years, she wrote in 1735, 
she depended entirely upon the little shop kept by 
herself and her sister, receiving no support from her 
husband. To such a father, violent, half-insane, jeal- 
ous but without affection, and to such a mother, 
lavishing the love that he withheld, inspiring by her 
ambition, constantly schooling herself in restraint 
and self-denial, were born twelve children — the poet's 
date of birth being December 26, 1716. His father 
refused to educate him, but his mother sent him at 
the age of eleven, to Eton, and gave him the train- 
ing of a scholar. At Eton he formed an intimate 
friendship with the brilliant Horace Walpole and the 
gifted Richard West — a man of refined tastes and 
great learning, whose early death cut short not only 
a most promising life, but an influence that was 
most healthful and happy to Gray. 

From Eton Gray went to Cambridge, where he re- 
mained four years studying the classics, Italian, 
French, a little of history and philosophy, and lead- 
ing the life of a reflective scholar. After graduation 
from Cambridge in 1739, his friend, Walpole, invited 
himi to make the grand tour of Europe with him, 
generously offering to pay all expenses and yet leave 
him in full independence in gratifying his own wishes. 
Although during the tour a quarrel occasioned by 
some trifling cause made a breach that existed for 
a few years — indeed, it never fully healed — it fur- 
nished the most enjoyable years of the poet's life. 
The diverse beauties of scenery, the treasures of art, 
Xhe life so different from that of his native land, ap- 



ii6 A Golden Way. 

pealed wonderfully to his reserved but absorbing 
nature. Returning to England, he lived henceforth 
a life without strong contrasts, its course filled with 
the commonplace. Shortly after his return his father 
died, and his mother removed to Stoke, near Windsor, 
to have the company of her sister. The means of 
the family being limited, Gray took up residence at 
Cambridge, where he could live more economically, 
and thenceforth he vibrated back and forth between 
Cambridge and Stoke. A lover of nature and her 
feathered songsters, he found in the neighborhood 
of the woodland parish of Stoke, the Burnham 
Beeches, Burnham Common, and all the delightful 
surrounding country, and in the companionship and 
letters of his friends, all the society and solitude 
that he desired. His notes on the flowers upspring- 
ing at his feet are worthy of Gilbert White. The 
songs of the birds rippled into his verse : — 



'There pipes the lark, and the song-thrush there 
Scatters his loose notes in the waste of air." 



In 1741 his beloved friend. West, died; in 1753 
his mother, whose devotion he had so fully recip- 
rocated, passed away, leaving him the only remain- 
ing member of the family. In 1762 he was appointed 
Regius professor of History at Cambridge — an office 
whose duties he never performed, — and on July 30, 
1771, he died, midway in his fifty-fifth year. Such 
are the simple annals of the life of him in whose 
memory the college where he lived and wrote has 



In and Out of London. 117 

never placed a commemorative tablet, but whose 
name has become familiar wherever culture exists, 
— because he gave to the world a classic — A71 Elegy 
Writteti in a Country Churchyard. 

Sensitive, retiring, meditative, somewhat melan- 
choly, of strong friendships, he was preeminently 
the poet of contemplation, not the man of speech 
and action. Perhaps it is enough for us that we and 
all posterity are the heirs of what he wrought in 
silence and sadness, with infinite pains seeking the 
perfection of expression for noble thoughts that 
were born to live. 

Gray is said to have felt the first strong predilec- 
tions for poetry when in his schooldays he read 
Virgil for delight. Of the two poems that have 
given him fame — the Ode on a Distant Prospect of 
Eton College, and the Elegy Written in a Conntry 
Churchyard, — the first was written in August, 1742, 
and the latter begun later, probably in November, 
in the same year. The slow habits of Gray are well 
shown by the facts that the Ode was not published 
until 1747, when it was issued by the publisher, 
Dodsley, without the name of the author, and that 
the Elegy was not completed until eight years after 
it was begun, — the last lines being written in June, 
1750, its first appearance in printed form being in 
January, 175 1. 

The Elegy was written on four sides of a sheet of 
common letter paper, about seven inches by nine, 
with numerous corrections and interlineations, the 
folds and creases showing that it was evidently car- 



Ii8 A Golden Way. 

ried in a pocketbook, whence it was taken to be 
read to those choice friends who would appreciate it. 
Gray was reluctant to publish it. He was greedy 
neither for fame or gold. In some way, possibly 
through Walpole, a copy of it came into the posses- 
sion of the editor of the Magazine of Magazines, 
who wrote to the author that the magazine was 
about to publish it, and that he desired to corre- 
spond with him. The poem was given to Dodsley 
for publication, the author stipulating that it should 
appear as anonymous, and declining to receive any 
pay for it, because he had a sensitive notion that 
it was beneath a gentleman to sell the inventions of 
his mind. So Gray received nothing for it, and 
Dodsley made four thousand pounds, for the success 
of the poem was immediate. Of the first edition 
" the paper was coarse, the pages seven, the attrac- 
tions of the first page were a scythe and an hour 
glass, and the price was sixpence." There was no 
break between the stanzas. From this original edi- 
tion there were many changes in the later editions, 
the writer's taste leading him to suppress some stan- 
zas and to make emendations in others. The sup- 
pressed stanzas are of great beauty, and while we 
would not restore to the poem anything that the 
exquisite taste of Gray led him to reject, we may 
well preserve them in annotations. 

Of the beauty of the poem itself, one finds it diffi- 
cult to speak. Its dignified theme, its rare felicity 
of phrase, the perfect music of its heroic quatrains, 
do not alone explain its charm. It touches, like the 



In and Out of London. 119 

music of the masters, thoughts that lie too deep for 
tears ; it sets ringing in our hearts sweet consonant 
chords, — chords that may sound not alone in the 
being of the scholar, but even in the hearts of the un- 
lettered ; it has given to the world more quoted 
phrases than any other single short poem : — 

" Jewels five wordslong, 
That on the stretched finger of all Time 
Sparkle forever." 

There is a touching little story of Mr. vScudder's 
— " How ' Weak Job ' saw the Prince — " that haunted 
my brain whenever I saw the gray walls and guarded 
entrances behind which princes and princesses were 
hidden. Princes and fairies walked hand in hand 
through all my earliest reading, and somehow I have 
never been able to lose the illusion that they are 
alike beings of another world — the world of pure 
and sweet imagination. " Weak Job " dwelt for 
weeks in expectation of seeing the Prince when he 
should visit his city. It was his first thought in the 
morning and his last thought at night. And when 
the day came, and his feet ran swiftly towards the 
great Avenue of the city through which the Prince 
was to pass, when the shoutings and cheerings and 
music were ringing clear upon his ears and the 
glorious sight was almost within his vision, a poor 
wretch who had fallen appealed to him for help. To 
give aid was to lose the grand spectacle ; to rush on, 
deaf to the call, was to disobey Duty. And so 
" Weak Job " stooped to the unfortunate, and saw 



120 A Golden Way. 

not the Prince as he passed. But, lo ! as he lifted 
the poor man to his feet and ministered to his needs, 
a mightier pageant than any of earth swept before 
him : a more glorious presence than any of earth 
bent over him, — the very Prince of Princes and the 
King of Glory. My telling the story has no appli- 
cation and no moral. No wretch sought my aid as 
I hurried on my way to see the Princess ; no call of 
Duty deterred me ; and yet I found myself saying, 
" Dear ' Weak Job,' poor ' Weak Job,' I wish that 
you were here with me to see the Princess." 

A royal Drawing Room was to be held, and the 
Queen was in Scotland. Therefore the Princess of 
Wales was to receive, and as Marlborough House is 
a distance from Buckingham Palace, she would ride 
in state from the one residence to the other. There 
were crowds of people along the Mall, all the way 
from Marlborough House, past St. James Palace, to 
the gates of Buckingham Palace, and past them again 
and again swept the carriages of those bidden to the 
Drawing Room. Drivers and footmen, immaculate 
in dress, in small clothes, with huge bouquets upon 
their breasts, rode past in all the consciousness of their 
high estate, and within the carriages were those who 
were to be presented with those who were their 
sponsors. The front seats of the carriages were 
filled by the enormous bouquets and the wonderful 
trains of the ladies whose beauty and jewels and 
glory of raiment adorned the back seats. In full 
dress, with costly wraps but half concealing their 
decollete dresses worn, diamonds sparkling from 



In and Out of London. 121 

throats as white as swans', and with the three feath- 
ers surmounting their elaborate coiffures, they 
formed a constantly changing and fascinating sight 
to us who waited for the Princess. Adown the 
Mall sweeps the royal Horse, all scarlet and gold, — 
the sunlight flashing from their helmets and their 
long crests waving in the air, flawless in dress and 
carriage, on their way to Marlborough House 
to act as escort. A state carriage drives past us 
conveying a slender princess, all in black, — the 
Duchess of York. Now another follows, conveying 
Her Grace of Buccleugh, the Mistress of the Robes. 
There is a craning of necks, for the Royal Horse is 
coming proudly back, escorting the splendid state 
carriage ; and in the state carriage, all in white 
satin, with a diamond tiara crested with three white 
plumes surmounting her royal head, is the Princess. 
How young she looks, how beautiful, and how 
charming ! And when she bends her head and 
smiles so winsomely, looking straight into our faces, 
and so near to us, may we not assume that the bow 
and the smile are our very own, and store them 
away in the treasure-house of memory? And did 
we see the Prince? Ah, yes! for he rode with the 
Princess, and he looked both royal and gracious. 

There was a special service at St. Paul's Cathe- 
dral one Sunday afternoon during our stay in Lon- 
don, in aid of the hospital. As we reached the 
entrance a procession of state carriages came slowly 
up, bearing those who were to be the especial 



122 A Golden Way. 

guests on the occasion — all in their robes and deco- 
rations. We entered the cathedral and went up 
one of the aisles until we reached a barrier. 
Against this we leaned until seats might be taken, 
and here we saw the entrance of the civic and legal 
dignitaries. From a side entrance there came a 
long procession of be-robed and be-jeweled men, 
the City Marshal in a bright red uniform, the sher- 
iffs, the sword-bearer, the mace-bearer, and the 
Lord Mayor. The chief usher as this last official 
came slowly down the aisle, announced in a loud 
and clear voice, " The Honorable the Lord Mayor." 
The procession came down to the bar against which 
we leaned, and then turned into a dressing-chamber. 
After a slight wait another procession came in 
purple and ermine and wigs, the last member having 
a long purple gown the train of which was carried 
by a gentleman-in-waiting, in small clothes. The 
chief usher again lifted up his clear voice to an- 
nounce " The Right Honorable the Lord Chancel- 
lor." The Lord Chancellor looked every bit as 
dignified as the title would lead one to expect, and 
the wig and robe lent to his large and somewhat 
haughty features the full awe and majesty of the 
law. Li the dressing-room the procession was again 
formed, and as it came forth each member of it re- 
ceived a bouquet, according to some old custom. 
When the majesty of the courts and the city had 
received its proper attention and its representatives 
had been honorably seated, the majesty of heaven 
was appealed to and the divine service proceeded. 



In and Out of London. 123 

One day we stole out from London — sto/eseems the 
appropriate word when one takes the underground 
railway — to llighgate and its cemetery, for in this 
field of the dead lie the ashes of " George Eliot." I 
had never before seen mounds so near together, 
graves so closely crowding graves, the stones so 
thickly set that a guide is necessary for the stranger 
who would find some particular one. " It's the 
wuth o' the land that makes 'em set 'em so near," 
said the guardian. " We wish to find the grave of 
• George Eliot,' said I to him. " Will you kindly 

tell me ," but he broke in upon me. " You're 

Americans, I know," said he; "there's a hundred of 
your people comes here with that question to one 
Englishman." His directions were so minute that, 
in the wilderness of crossing paths, we came to the 
one narrow one by whose side was the stone we 
sought. The lot was one of the smallest — scarcely 
larger than the cofifin that it covered, and the plain 
stone bore the simplest inscription. No loving hand 
had planted any flowers there ; no bunch or wreath 
of remembrance lay upon the mound. Only a single 
daisy turned its pale pink blossom to the open sky, — 
an air-sown flower, its life as lonely as hers on 
whose grave it bloomed. Had I known I should 
have brought some flowers, but my hands were 
empty, though my heart was full. 

A pleasant way leads from Highgate to Parliament 
Hill. Here is the freedom of the country, its wide 
stretch of fields over which the winds blow unfet- 
tered by crowded houses, little lakes as Nature 



124 A Golden Way. 

roughly set them, upland winding paths, and grassy 
slopes. Quiet groups are stretched in the sun, 
children are playing on the expanse, and from the 
summit groups of people are gazing down upon 
London whose towers and spires, as far as the eye 
reaches, stretch upward from the City's smoky, over- 
hanging atmosphere. Here the conspirators waited 
on that gray November morning in 1605 to watch the 
event of the Guy Fawkes plot^to see the Houses of 
Parliament shoot skyward. 

A long time ago, when William the Norman 
came across the water-way to England, there was 

in his train a certain Esquire, named Adam B , to 

whom for bravery and nobility the monarch gave a 
large tract of land in Sussex, and so founded the 
estate of an old English family. Perchance it is 
idle to tell the history of this family save to say 
that its sons and its resources were ever at the serv- 
ice of the nation. Its men fought at the battle of 
Poictiers and that of Crecy, and gave liberally to 
defend England against the Spanish Armada. On 
the river Arun that flows through their estate they 
were granted the sole right to keep swans — an un- 
usual privilege — and so a swan appears as a crest on 

their coat of arms. And when John B , in charge 

of the Sussex men, took the castle of Fontenoy in 
France, Edward the lilack Prince gave him a castle 
as another crest. From the time of tlie first Ada:m 
B the home of the family has been on the beauti- 
ful Sussex acres given by the Conqueror, and to these 



In and Out of London. 125 

acres the alliances of marriage have added more 
lands. In the earliest days of New England history; 
some younger sons of this family came to the beauti- 
ful Merrimac Valley, bringing, I hope, some of the 
valor and high purpose of the home stock, taking- 
root, and becoming in the passing of the years an 
old New England family. It was because we were 
late-born twigs upon this New England tree, that 
we were desirous of seeing the family home in the 
older England. So from London we wrote to the 
present head of the house, a baronet, asking per- 
mission, without intruding upon him, to see the old 
house, the old church, and to wander beside the 
Arun on the old estate. The response was so im- 
mediate, so charming in its cordiality, and so gen- 
erous in its hospitality, that we made the initial 
of the day that we were to spend there a red letter, 
and the courtesy that we experienced was so unaf- 
fected and pleasing that the glow of its color lingers 
over all our English days. 

To leave London early in the morning, after hav- 
ing made a hazardous trip among and beween nu- 
merous carts that bring vegetables to the city, to 
fly by train through delightful suburbs farther and 
farther into the country, to come at last into the 
pastoral county of Sussex, to be met by a coach 
emblazoned with one's own crest, gives even an in- 
dependent American a thrill. We were driven 
along an ideal country road, over an old stone 
bridge upon the Arun, and across the meadows of 
the river we saw the gray stone walls of the mansion 



126 A Golden Way. 

arise. By the lodge, which the roses almost 
smothered and the rhododendrons hedged in, up 
a circular driveway, between trees — I know not how 
old — and borders of shrubs that cast a wealth of 
perfume on the air, and the carriage stopped at the 
porch above which the arms of the family are carved. 
The grave butler met us and ushered us 
through the oaken hall, from those walls the faces 
of our ancestors looked down upon us, ancestors 
who lived before New England was, and who could 
not have whispered, " Kinsmen from our colonies 
beyond the seas," because they were dust before 
England had colonies there. In the great drawing- 
room we were given the pleasantest of welcomes by 

Sir Walter and Lady B, and after chatting for 

a few minutes we walked through the gardens and 
across the fields where pheasants for the fall shooting 
were being bred, to the old church, built by the family 
early in the thirteenth century, on the site and pos- 
sibly incorporating the remains of an older Saxon 
church. Beneath the church lie those who died in 
the centuries before the founding of New England." 
" Our common ancestors," said the lord of the lands. 
Their stones are the floor of the church, and the 
rolls of carpeting were carefully lifted that wc might 
see the brasses and the inscriptions that mark them. 
Near by is the old manor-house of one of the allied 
families, whose house and estates were joined by mar- 
riage with those of the family of the mansion house. 
It is a beautiful house, with hexagonal chimneys 
and many of the characteristics of the Tudor 



In and Out of London. 127 

style, — a type worth being copied in modern archi- 
tecture. 

Over the delicious kincheon that was served in 
the old dining-room of the mansion house, where 
the portraits of the later members of the family 
kept us company, England, Old and New, discussed 
a hundred questions, — the amity between the older 
and the younger nation, art, literature, national 
characteristics, — and the hour sped all too soon. 
After the master of the estate had taken us walking 
over its acres, the mistress called for her own car- 
riage that she might take us to see the beauties of 
the country from some distant hills. The drive 
took us past romantic rose-covered cottages, be- 
tween hedges, by thickets where the honeysuckle 
was first unfolding its fragrant bloom, and along 
banks which the heather was tinting with its rich 
purple. Then from the hill which was our goal 
there spread a view of pastoral lands far-reaching, 
with horizon lines of hill crests, and streams steal- 
ing quietly in winding ways, — peaceful, restful, 
blown by gentlest airs and bathed in softest light. 

A delicious five-o'clock tea in the drawing-room, 
a clasping of hands in good-by and the day was 
done. And yet, whenever I think of England, the 
memory of that day comes — the day when the sun 
shone softest, the light fell sweetest, on the golden 
■way that we traversed. 

Among the pictures that I gathered that day is 
one that I call the shadow bridge. And I tell this 
story as a legend about it : In the days when the 



128 A (ioldcn Way. 

lieathen ijursucd tlic Christian a lioly band was 
closely followed by those who sought to do them 
violence. Before the fugitives lay the river, and 
there was no passage across it. ]^ut when they had 
lifted their hearts in prayer for deliverance, lo ! a 
bridge, stout and firm, lay across the water. They 
crossed, but when the foe attempted passage it 
was like mist to their feet. They saw it and the 
church beyond it as a bridge of fancy and a church 
of dreams, and, softened by the wonder, they bowed 
and became followers of the true faith. 

Can 5'ou not see the bridge of fancy and the 
church of dreams, the meadows and the stream, and 
the swans ? And must I give a less poetic reason 
for it all ? Know', tlien, that the shadowy bridge 
and tower is but the result of misapplied economy 
— the vain effort to give a clear result from two 
exposures of one plate — a fabric of fancy on the 



s:olden 



o 



zvaj'. 



VI. 

THE DEVON LAND : ENVOY. 

Dear strengthful land, formed for wild deeds of might, 
Upon thy somber ways there falls a light, 

A glory born not of the sun or moon ; 
By Fancy's spell uprose in this stern place 
The fairest daughter of thy rugged race, — 

Sweet Lorna Doone. 

Whatever charm the city may weave around me 
the heart of nature has a stronger spell. Life is at 
its high tide when sotne highway invites the feet to 
sylvan delights, or when from the stage-coach the 
clean upland breeze smites the face, or the airs blown 
soft through gentle valleys cool and refresh. So I 
shall remember long the tingling of fresh life through 
my being as we left the railway at Minehead and 
mounted the coach for the " Lorna Doone country." 
If in all England there is so wildly romantic a road, 
so fitting an entrance to such a scene of strength 
and wildness and romance the golden way did not 
lead through it. The long tree-bordered Minehead 
street leads to a valley up whose steep sides 
the coach slowly mounts. Beyond are sweeping 
views of Dunkery, of the wild steeps of Exmoor. 
Lanes and narrow roads, branching, invite us to 
beauties of which gray church towers and pictur- 
esque cottages hint. Then we sweep down a lovely 
9 »29 



130 A Golden Wa}''. 

vale and come into quaint Porlock. Wherever a 
cottage lies beside the road, sweetly sleeping in 
the sun, there is a war of the roses upon its sides — 
the red and the white marshaling their hosts of 
blossoms and breathing sweetest challenges from 
stalks that clamber to the very roofs. Tall, stately 
foxgloves, all abloom, stand in lines along the way, 
and stiffly sway and nod as we sweep past. Shy, 
modest poppies look forth beneath the wheat heads, 
like modest blushing country maidens, while their 
bolder sisters surmount the grain and flaunt their 
brilliant beauty full in our faces. And there are 
valley views with waters that tempt the fisherman, 
and stretches of purple-clad heights which say to 
the hunter "Come hither!" for in this Devon 
neighborhood there is abundant reward for the 
angler, and here alone the wild red deer tempts — 
and baffles, we hope — the devotee of the chase. 
" There was one seen this morning," says the 
driver, " as we came over the stretch beyond Por- 
lock hill." So we strain our eyes, and turn many a 
bit of distant heather into a mountain stag. 

Porlock should be forever preserved, embalmed, 
and it should be a capital crime to diminish a bit 
of its picturesqueness by the introduction of any- 
thing modern. Once it was a seaport — the sea-gate 
to Somerset and Devon — and many a battle was 
fought here between the invader and the invaded. 
Then the sea withdrew a mile and a half, but left 
the old Ship Inn to give a nautical flavor to the 
place. 




OLD SHIP INN, PORLOCK 



Page 130 



The Devon Land : Envoy. 131 

If old tars no longer exchange sea-stories in its 
bar-room, or lean out of its latticed windows, the 
hunters of the deer gather here in August and tell 
tales of the chase. The most picturesque of cot- 
tages peep around corners, and run down the crooked 
ways. Their funny back chimneys are at the front 
of the houses, the myrtles shield their white walls, 
climbing and blossoming flowers scent the air from 
their gardens, and their straw-thatched roofs, of 
varying depths of gray, stand softly outlined against 
a sky of gentle blue. 

Here first we feel that we are entering a country 
over which the romancist has cast his spell of en- 
chantment, for here is an inn called the " Lorna 
Doone," and we remember that John Ridd's dear 
father had been killed by the Doones of Bagworthy 
while riding home from Porlock market on a Sat- 
urday evening. 

From Porlock the road rises up a four-mile hill, 
and to a height of 1400 feet. So entrancing was 
the constantly widening sweep of the scene, so ex- 
hilarating the air, so joyous the sense of freedom 
and the absence of restraint, that it seemed hardly 
a mile to us who walked it. There are some white 
stones on the way half way up the hill, called "The 
Devil's Throw," which his satanic being flung for 
practise from Hurlstone Point, seven miles or so 
away. At Culbone stables the coach stops to change 
the wearied horses, and the traveler should make a 
longer stay to visit the little Culbone Church. 

The way that leads to it is one from which there 



132 A Golden Way. 

are views of the sea, and the music of the surf break- 
ing on the sand-bars, commingHng with theit of a 
stream amid the woods of Ashley Combe. By and 
by we enter a combe— the local name of a valley — 
shaded deeply by overhanging trees, filled with the 
melody of a singing brook, and shut in by its moun- 
tainous sides from the garish day. And here, on a 
green level, four hundred feet above the waters of 
the ocean and with the hills rising eight hundred 
feet above it, is Culbone Church — the smallest parish 
church in tlie kingdom — and its little surrounding 
yard of the dead. The tiny building with its tiny 
window is surmounted by a tiny steeple pointed by 
a gilt cross on wliich tlie rays of the sun fall but for 
four months of the year. Romantic but lonely in 
its situation, it is one of the three churches of the 
old distich : — 

"Culbone, Oare, and Stoke Pero, 
Parishes where no parson'll go." 

Visitors make a playful pretense of being unable 
to find it on account of its smallness, and the story 
is told that one tourist, having searched for it un- 
successfully, asked a man, whom he met on the way, 
where Culbone Church was. The man pointed to 
this Liliputian box. 

" But that can't be a church," said the tourist ; " it 
hasn't any steeple." 

" It's the churcli, to be sure," said the man, "and 
I've the steeple in my pocket, a-carrying it home 
to mend it." 



The Devon Land : Envoy. 133 

Beyond Culbone stables the Oare valley lies on 
our left. And there is the Great Black Hill, with 
the Doone Valley beyond. A glimpse of the Badge- 
worthy Valley is caught just where our highway 
crosses the road that wanders down to " Plovers 
Barrows Farm " and Oare Church. 

"Someday," we say, " we will return, and wander 
where the stout frame of John Ridd carried him, by 
Plovers Barrows Farm, where * are trees and bright 
green grass and orchards full of contentment, and a 
man may scarce espy a brook, although he hears it 
everywhere ; ' by the Badgeworthy water and the 
slide, to Oare church, where, when the lilacs were 
all in bloom for the marriage of Lorna and John, 
the dastard shot of Carver Doone stained the yel- 
low altar steps with the blood of the lovely bride." 

We pass the white County Gate — the bound be- 
tween Somerset and Devon, — and then the road 
skirts the steep side of the mountain, is cut into it, 
and there is only a bank of turf to save the coach 
from rolling six hundred feet down the precipitous 
cliff side to the sea. The drags of the coach are out, 
and turning and winding down the tremendous de- 
scent, we drop into the valley that is Lynmouth — 
the valley where the East Lyn and the West Lyn, 
coming wild and swift from their separate courses, 
join their waters and flow peacefully the few hun- 
dred feet into the ocean. But above the mouth of 
the Lyn, perched almost immediately over the val- 
ley village of Lynmouth, is Lynton, and up the steep 
hill thereto the six horses drag their burden only by 



134 A Golden Way. 

many a twist and turn and halt. As for us, we bore 
our own burden, and came by a hard climb to the 
top of the hill. There, at the entrance of the path- 
way to her domain, the landlady of the Royal Castle 
met us, mistook us for some greater personages — 
who didn't come — and ushered us into the best 
chamber of the house. From its windows, afar over 
a sea that was glorious with the tints of the setting 
sun, and upon whose waters little white-sailed sloops 
were hurr\'ing to the harbor — white doves seeking 
their nest — afar over such a sea were the shadowy 
outlines of the Welsh coast. At the foot of the 
steep wooded hill nestled the village of Lynmouth. 
Beyond were the moors and the valleys of the Lyn 
rivers, while, bold, stern, and awful, the great prom- 
ontory of the Countisbury Foreland thrusts its huge 
mass out into the sea, as if to challenge its might. 

It rained gently in the morning, and then the sun 
shone forth and turned the tree-covered hillside to 
resplendence and kissed the sea, which dimpled 
with a myriad smiles in return. The boats unfurled 
their white sails and glided forth, while now near 
and now afar the excursion boats left their trail of 
smoke. There is a funicular railway that slides 
down from Lynton to Lynmouth, — a double-tracked 
railway with a car at the base of one track and one 
at the height of the other. These cars are con- 
nected by a cable which winds around a great wheel 
at the top. The upper car is ballasted with enough 
water to slightly overbalance the weight of the car 
at the foot of the other track. It slides down the 



The Devon Land : Envoy. 135 

hill with its passengers, and so draws up the hill the 
other car with its passengers. At the base of the 
hill the water is let out of the reservoir, while the 
one at the top is filled. 

We chose to walk down the hill, however, and 
found that the rain had made the road slimy, and 
given a treacherous footing to a steep descent. 
At the base of the coach road we turned into the 
" Watersmeet way," passing some very attractive 
shops, and winding between two rows of cottages 
that prettily framed the Lynton hill. 

I stopped to photograph the scene, and caught 
on my plate the milk-boy and his cart on their 
round. 

" Now I shall take you back to America," I said 
laughingly. 

" Ah, weel," said the man who was trudging by 
the team, " ye can say that he is an honest Devon- 
shire milk lad." 

We dropped down from the highway at this 
point, and went up by the East Lyn. On and on we 
walked by a constant succession of little cascades 
and foam-beaten rocks, where the river, exulting 
and laughing, hurries on the way to its eternity — 
the sea — glad, excited, and ever musical. Every 
step revealed new beauties. The high hills girt us 
round, threatened to bar our way, and yet left ever 
a path by the brook course. The flowers bloomed in 
profusion along the path,— wild roses, white and 
pink, foxgloves, stone-croft, and delicate harebells. 
The trees were tenanted by songful birds, and 



136 A Golden Way. 

their s\va}-ing limbs, like /Eolian harps, broke the 
sweep of the wind into soft rhythmic melody. By 
such a way, over wliose succeeding and varied charms 
I shouted louder and louder, we came to a little foot- 
bridge that led across the stream. On our side of 
the bridge was an invitation to drop a penny in the 
box and then cross to the cot on the other side. 
Supj^osiiig that it might l.)e some toll affair, I fol- 
lowed the directions, and when the door opened 
stood eager to rcccixe the penny's worth of knowl- 
edge. 

" Go back over the bridge," said the girl who 
opened the door, "and keep on the same path." 

" l^ut why do } ou in\ite people to cross your 
bridge and pay }-ou a penny for such information," 
cried I, somewhat aghast at this bucolic bunco 
scheme. 

" Oh," she replied, " there's plenty of people who 
are never sure tjiey are right, even with the path 
straight before them. They're always crossing the 
bridge and knocking at the door, an^-how, and a 
penny is cheap enough for the bother." 

It was after three miles of such river-side walking 
that we came to a broad opening, where, on the right 
bank of the stream, the soft turf stretches away, 
level and green, — a patch of gentleness where all else 
is ragged and wild. i\nd here the Combe Park Water 
on the right comes leaping and foaming, breaking 
from ledge to ledge, noisy and tumultuous, and the 
East Lyn on the left glides in prettil\- and softly, 
with a ripple like a maiden's laugh, and before this 



The Devon Land : Envoy. 137 

green altar, with the great hills marshaling them- 
selves about as witnesses, there is that union of the 
two streams, that bridal of strength and gentle grace, 
that is called " Watersmeet." 

Nature is uncopyable. She paints in colors all 
her own. She veils; she hides ; she softens; and 
then about her softest scenes she breathes a music 
— perchance the ripple of a stream or the musical 
roar of a torrent ; perchance the gentle soughing of 
the wind through the trees ; perchance the thunder 
of waves against a rocky shore, or the soft lapping 
of the tide upon a shingly beach — which becomes 
a part of the picture. Imagine waves breaking in 
silence against the cliffs ; cascades or waterfalls that 
are soundless ; w inds that make no music through 
the leaves ; — and half the charm of what we see is 
gone. Watersmeet is so full of melody, of life, of 
laughter, so peaceful, so guarded, that one feels very 
near to the heart of Nature,' — but if he would make 
captive its charm on canvas or plate, he finds how 
elusive that charm is. 

" This is Combe Park Water," we say, " only you 
must imagine the sparkle of its flow between deli- 
cate bending branches that sway above it. And 
that is Lyn River, only you cannot see how like a 
fall of soft lace the leaves cast their shadows on its 
surface, nor how the light makes every ripple lu- 
minous. The birds are singing in the woods — if you 
could hear how sweetly ! — and he who is sitting 
on the bank is reading from Lorna Doonc\\o\\ morn- 
ing broke in such a sfjot as this; — - 



138 A Goltk'ii Way. 

" Suddenly tlic s^ladsonic lii;lit leaped over hill and 
valley, casting amber, blue, and puri)le, and a tint 
of rich red rose, accordinL; tt) the scene they lit on, 
and the curtain flunt;" around ; yet all alike dispel- 
ling fear and the cloven hoof of darkness, all on the 
wings of hope advancing, and proclaiming God is 
lure. Then life and joy sprang reassured from every 
crouching hollow ; every flower, and bud, and bird, 
had a fluttering sense of them ; and the flashing of 
God's gaze merged into soft beneficence. 

'■'■ So pcrJiaps shall break npo]i lis that eternal viorn- 
i)ig, ivJieii erag a)id eliasm shall be no more, neither 
hill nor valley, nor great iini'intaged oeean ; ivhen 
glory shall not seare happi//ess, neither happiness 
envy glory ; but all things shall arise and shine in 
the light of the Father s eoiintenanee, beeause itself is 
risen." 

Though there is a good bridge farther down the 
stream, one loves to cross the falls of the Combe 
Park Water by the log that lias been thrown across 
it, and look down with a trace of giddiness into its 
flood and fury.. Then he crosses the gentler waters 
of the Lyn by a rough bridge of boards, and climbs 
up among oaks and hazel and birches to follow its 
course along the high bank above it. Thence we 
look down upon a stream that now breaks impetu- 
ously over craggy falls, nov^' rests in shaded pools, and 
now chatters to the myriad stones that l^reak its 
course. Anon there comes to our ears a. deeper roar 



9 MM ^-? ^i^^^^ 




--• 


• ^-^S 


ilK. 







THE LYCH-GATE AT BRENDON CHURCH Page 138 



The Devon Land : Envoy. 139 

sustained and heavy, where the waterplungesthrough 
a narrow course over jagged rocks to the Long Pool. 
" Shut in by abrupt cHffs," says one who loves this 
spot, " draped and festooned with fern and hanging 
creepers, dark and sunless almost always, for the 
length of a hundred yards or more the river creeps 
along, exhausted secniingly by the turmoil of its 
previous course." ]5eyoiid are pools and cascades 
innumerable, until the path drops and wc enter the 
hamlet of Rockford. We cross the foot-bridge here, 
and climb the steep red road that leads past Brendon 
church. The way is narrow. The church rests just 
at the top of the hill, l^'rom its peaceful graveyard 
the land slopes down to the roaring stream below. 
The sundial above the porch bears the date 1707. 
The entrance to the church or the yard is through 
the old lych-gate, and in the middle of this and 
dividing the steps is that rare feature — a coffin-stone. 
For when the dead are borne into this last resting- 
place, the cofifin is rested on this stone while the first 
part of the service is read. Then it is borne into 
the church for the conclusion of the service. 

While I was clambering up the opposite bank to 
catch with my camera this unique and beautiful 
gateway, my brother wandered on, and soon came 
back with the neighboring school at his heels, a 
merry, bright-eyed, and honest-faced set of Devon 
lads and lassies. They kept us company almost to 
the Ilft)rd bridges, and were only recalled by a treble 
and furious ringing of the teacher's bell. The school 
was small, they told us, it being sheep-shearing time. 



140 A Golden Way. 

At I If Old bridge we chose the homeward path that 
led across the moors — as lonely a region as earth 
has, its surface dull with the heather, with steep de- 
scents, down which the wild mountain sheep leaped 
I know not whither, and far-reaching valleys through 
which we caught glimpses of Lynton on its hill, and 
Lynmouth by its harbor. 

Faint paths wander here and there by which the 
mischievous pyxies may mislead the incautious 
traveler, and tall hedges separate one man's do- 
main from that of his neighbor. Almost within 
paths that we knew, with Lynmouth lying just 
below us, wc, alas ! — were pyxie-lcd, and wandered 
here and there on Summer House Plill only to find 
the end of each way barred by some hedge or steep 
descent. Finally we plunged at random down the 
declivity and unexpectedly came into a path that 
led us to the place where the old stone bridge crosses 
the brawling Lyn to the coach road. When we had 
reached Lynmouth and climbed the steep hill to 
our abiding place, when we had bathed and sat 
down to the sweet anci inviting table, our eyes 
wandered over the hills and moors where our day 
had been spent, and we sighed to think that it was 
past. And then we knew as we ate the clotted 
cream why none other in all England can have its 
flavor — for the Devon kine feed and browse on the 
delectable mountains. 

On the morrow it showered gently, as it had on 
the previous morning, but remembering how beauti- 



The Devon Land : Envoy. 141 

ful a yesterday had been born of a showery morn- 
ing, we turned our steps toward the North Cliff 
Walk. From Countisbury Foreland I had noticed 
the precipitous descent of this North Cliff, and the 
thread of a path that lay along and far up its side, 
and I had wondered why the pedestrians on it did 
not go reeling adown into the ocean below. And 
when I had turned from the lane which one enters 
by the Valley of Rocks Hotel, into that narrow way 
hewn along this precipice, I kept for a while close 
to the jagged wall on the left, lest my head should 
grow dizzy and my feet stumble. And yet adown 
the rough steep, where I scarcely allowed my gaze 
to wander, the mountain sheep skipped fearlessly 
from rock to rock, and their tender bleating kids 
followed and fell not. 

Here above the path are massive battlements of 
granite, hundreds of feet high, their line against the 
sky fretted with turrets and moucharabies ; and 
here below the path down hundreds of feet, even 
into the sea, have rolled hunderds of fragments 
that have been beaten from the battlements by 
time and frost. The great stony outcrops are red- 
dened not with blood but with iron ; the lichens 
have diversified the color of the rocks with their 
green and the stone-crop has stained them v/ith its 
Vermillion ; little bushes have taken root between 
the rocks; and grass has drawn sustenance from 
the dust into which they have crumbled. As the 
path winds there comes into view something like the 
ruined height of a noble fortress — Castle Rock, — 



142 A (lolden Way. 

rising sheer four hundred feet from tlie sea, while, 
beyond, Duty Point reaches out into the waters. 
This great battleniented wall hides behind it a valley 
strewn with stony debris, with here and there stone 
slabs piled one upon anotlier. 

This is the great Valley of Rocks, and the slabs 
are the Devil's Cheese-ring. Here it was that John 
Ridd came to consult Mother Meldrum, who kept 
her winters here, " sheltering from the wind and 
rain within the Devil's Cheese-ring. . . . Under 
eaves of lichened rock she had a winding passage, 
and none tliat I know of ever durst enter but her- 
self." Within the midst of this valley, — " a place 
to rest in ; to think that troubles are not if we 
would not make them ; to know the sea is outside 
the hills, but never to behold it," — I sat and re- 
called not alone John's visits to the wise woman, 
but the contest that he saw on Castle Rock. 

" She pointed to the Castle Rock, where, upon a 
narrow shelf, betwixt us and the coming stars, a bit- 
ter fight was waging. A fine fat sheep with an hon- 
est face had climbed up very carefully, to browse on 
a bit of juicy grass, now the dew of the land was upon 
it. To him, from an upper crag, a lean black goat 
came hurr^'ing with leaps and skirmish of the horns 
and an angry noise at his nostrils. The goat had 
grazed the place before to the utmost of his liking, 
cropping in and out with jerks as their manner is of 
feeding. Nevertheless he fell on the sheep with fury 
and great malice. 

" The simple wether was very much inclined to re- 



The Devon Land : Envoy. 143 

tire from the contest, but looked around in vain for 
any way to peace and comfort. His enemy stood 
between him and the last leap he had taken ; there 
was nothing left but to fight, or be hurled into the 
sea, five hundred feet below. 

" ' Lie down, lie down ! ' I shouted to him, as if he 
were a dog, for I had seen a battle like this before, 
and knew that the sheep had no chance of life, ex- 
cept from his greater weight, and the difificulty of 
moving him. 

" The poor sheep turned, upon my voice, and 
looked at me sopiteously that 1 could gaze no longer, 
but ran with all my speed to try to save him from the 
combat. He saw that I could not be in time, for the 
goat was bucking to leap at him, and so the good 
wether stooped his forehead, with the harmless horns 
curling aside of it ; and the goat flung his heels up, 
and rushed at him with sharp jumps and tricks of 
movement, and the points of his long horns always 
foremost, and his little scut cocked like a gun^ 
hammer, 

" As I ran up the steep of the rock, I could not see 
what they were doing, but the sheep must have 
fought very bravely at last, and yielded his ground 
very slowly, and I almost hoped to save him. But 
j'lst as my head topped the platform of rock, I saw 
him flung from it backward, with a sad low moan 
and gurgle. His body made a vanishing noise in 
the air like a bucket thrown down a well-shaft, and 
I could not tell when it struck the water except by 
the echo among the rocks. So wroth was I with 



144 A Golden Way. 

the goat at that moment — being somewhat scant of 
breath, and nnable to consider — that I cauglit him 
by the right liind-lcg, before he could turn from his 
victory, and hurled him after the sheep, to learn how 
he liked his own compulsion." 

About Duty Point, whose wooded upward sweep 
we saw from the Cliff Walk-, there clings a story of 
the De Wichehalses, who dwelt close by in Lee 
Abbey. When Charles the First was king, the fair 
and only daughter of the De Wichehalses w^as Jeni- 
fred, whose beauty had won the favor of Lord 
Auberly, a favorite of the King. Betrothal followed 
favor, and the day for the wedding was set. As 
happy as the birds that sang in the Devon woods, 
as pink and white as the wild roses all abloom in the 
ways, she rose on her wedding morn. Her betrothed 
came not. She was alarmed for him. Some acci- 
dent had befallen him. Perhaps he was ill. No. 
A laggard messenger came with the word that he had 
proved false, and was already wedded to another. 
All the joy died in her heart ; all the roses fled from 
her cheek. She spoke not. Put when night came 
she stole down to the cliffs of Duty Point and flung 
herself over. And all night the sea sang her requiem 
for whose wedding the morning roses had bloomed. 

The father, sore stricken, rode away to the court 
and demanded vengeance on the fickle lover. But 
the king shielded him, and bade the old man return 
to his home. " Love is naught but a game that men 
play at," said he. 



The Devon Land : Envoy. 145 

Now De Wichehalse turned from a loyalist to a 
rebel, and threw himself against the king, and every- 
where he sought the false Auberly. At length in the 
battle of Lansdowne the father and faithless met, and 
with one mighty blow De Wichehalse broke through 
Auberly's guard, and clave his skull in twain. 

A twelvemonth later, the Royalist forces made 
an attack upon the Abbey, but in darkness De 
Wichehahe ran to the coast and pushed off with 
some companions in a boat. The sea, as merciless as 
the foe, overturned the boat, and cast the dead back 
upon the land. 

When reluctantly we left Lynton, we followed a 
road that led along the West Lyn, past Barbrook 
Mill, through a tiny village with so narrow a main 
street that we scraped acquaintance with the fuch- 
sias and climbing roses on either side, over hills from 
which only a sea of rolling downs stretched faraway, 
and so on and on until from Kentisbury Down we 
dropped to the long street of Combmartin. 

One Devon village differeth from another — from 
every other — in quaintness and beauty, and despite 
the clinging definition by which Charles Kingsley 
described Combmartin — " a mile-long man-sty " — 
I found its narrow street singularly interesting. It 
was late afternoon when our coach rattled into it — 
the red-coated driver making a great flourish of whips, 
and the light fell soft upon the gray stone cottages, 
which leaned out towards one another as if making 
neighborly confidences, flower-grown even to the 



146 A Golden Way. 

thatched roofs. The great and little Hangman's 
hills were bathed in mellow light, and the waters 
sparkled and gave back a glory of amber and green 
to the low-descending sun. 

But were all else of Combmartin to fade from my 
memory, I should cling to the visit to the gray stone 
church. The chancel, they say, is fully nine hundred 
years old, and the tower more than six hundred. 
The door is unlocked with a key that is five hundred 
years old, and in the vestry is an old oak chest — and 
I know not how many hundred years have gnawed 
at that, — and in the chest is an old silver and lead 
communion service. 

This church has been artistically and deliciously 
sketched by Marie Corelli in The Mighty Atom, and 
the description is not a whit less worthy because of 
the Devon dialect and the sweet philosophy. It is 
Reuben Dale — really James Norman, the verger, 
now dead — who. speaks to the sadly precocious boy, 
Lionel Valliscourt : — 

" Reuben approached the oaken screen and pointed 
out the twelve apostles carved upon it. 

" ' Now do'ee know, little zur,' said lie, ' why this 
'ere carvin' is at least two hunncr' years old — an' 
likely more'n that?' 

"'No,' answered Lionel, squeezing Jessamine's 
little warm hand in his own, out of sheer comfort 
that he was not to be separated from her yet. 

" ' Jest watch these 'ere gates as I pull 'em to an' 
fro,' continued Reuben. ' Do what ye will wi' em, 
they won't stay shut, — see I ' and he proved the fact 




A GLIMPSE OF LYNTON HILL. tSee page 1351 



Page 146 



I 



The Devon Land : Envoy. 147 

beyond dispute. ' Tliat shows they wos made 'fore 
the days o' Cromwell. For in them times all the 
gates o' th' altars was copied arter the pattern o' 
Scripture which sez, — " An the gates o' Heaven shall 
never be shut, either by day or by night." Then 
when Cromwell came an' broke up the statues, an' 
tore down the picters or whited them out whereso- 
ever they wos on th' walls, the altars wos made 
different, wi' gates that shut an' locked, — I s'pose 
'e wos that sing'ler afraid of idolatry that 'e thought 
the folks might go an' worship the Communion Cup 
on th' Lord's table. S'now ye'll be able to tell 
whether the altar-gates is old or new, by this one 
thing, — if they can't be shut they're 'fore Cromwell's 
day, — if they can they're wot's called modern gim- 
crackery. Now, see the roof ! 

" ' Folks ' as been 'ere an' said quite wiselike, — " O 
that roof's quite modern," — but 'tain't nuthin' o' th' 
sort. See them oak mouldings? — not one o' them's 
straight, — not a line ! They couldn't get 'em exact 
in them days, — they wasn't clever enough. So 
they're all crooked an' 'bout as old asth' altar-screen, 
— mebbe older, for if ye stand 'ere jest where I be, 
ye'll see they all bend one way more than t'other, 
makin' the whole roof look lop-sided like, an' why's 
that, d'ye think ? Well, they'd a reason for what 
they did in them old times an' a sentiment, too, — - 
an' they made the churches lean a bit to the side on 
which our Lord's head bent on the Cross when He 
said, " It is finished." Ye'll find nearly all th' old 
churches lean a bit that way, — it's a sign of age a? 



148 A Golden Way. 

well as a sis^n o' faith. Now look at these 'ere 
figures on the pews, — ain't they all got their 'eads 
cut off?' 

" Lionel admitted that they had, with a grave little 
nod. Jessamine, w'ho copied his every gesture for 
the moment, nodded too. 

" ' That wos Cromwell's doin', ' went on Reuben, — 
' 'E an' 'is men wos consumed-like wi' what they 
called the fury o' holiness, an' they thought all these 
figures wos false gods an' symbols of idolatry, an' 
they just cut their 'eads off, — executed 'em as 'twere, 
like King Charles, hisself. Now look up there, — 
there's a prutty color comin' through that bit o' 
glass ! It's the only mossel o' real old stained glass 
in the church, — an' it's a rare sight older than the 
church itself. D'ye know how to tell old stained 
glass from new ? No ? Well, I'll tell ye. When 
it's old it's very thick, — an' if ye put your hand on 
the wrong side- it's rough, — very rough, jest as if 
'twas covered wi' baked cinders, — that's alius a sure 
an' sartin proof o' great age. Modern stained glass 
ye'll find a 'most as smooth an' polished on its wrong 
side as on its right. Now, if ye coom into th' 
vestry, I'll show ye the real old chest what was 
used for Peter's pence when we was under Papist 
rule.' 

" ' An ' here's Peter's little money-box,' said he 
showing them a ponderous oak chest some five feet 
long and three high ; ' that 'ud hold a rare sight, 
o' pennies, wouldn't it ? ' 

" He threw it open, disclosing its black worm-eaten 



The Devon Land : Envoy. 149 

interior, with a few old bits of tarnished silver lying 
at the bottom, the fragments of a long disused Com- 
munion service. 

" ' Lor' bless me ! ' said Reuben, then, laughing a 
little, — ' there's a deal o' wot I call silly faith left 
in some o' the folk still. There wos a nice old leddy 
cam' 'ere las' summer, an' she believed that Peter 
hisself cam' down from Heaven o' nights, an' tuk 
all the money offered 'im, specially pennies, for they's 
the coins chiefly mentioned i' th' Testament, an' she 
axed me to let 'er put a penny in, — 1 s'pose she 
thought the saint might be in want o' it. " For, my 
good man," sez she to me, " 'ave you never 'eered 
that St. Peter still visits th' world, an' when he cooms 
down he might need this penny o' mine to buy 
bread." " Do as ye like, marm," sez I, — " it don't 
make no difference to me I'm sure ! " Well, she put 
the penny in, bless 'er'art ! — an' this Christmas past I 
wasa-cleanin' an' rubbin' up everything i' the church, 
an' in dustin' out this 'ere box I saw the penny, — 
St. Peter 'adn't come after it. So I jest tuk it, 'and 
he chuckled softly, ' I tuk it an' give it to a poor 
ole beggar-man outside the church-gate, — so I played 
Peter for once i' my life, an' not so badly I 'ope but 
wot I shall be furgiven.' " 

We passed, as did Lionel and Jessamine, out of 
the church into the air that was all fragrant with the 
scent of the roses and the sweetbrier and the wild 
thyme, and again we mounted the coach. The 
horses were fresh, and we sped along up a steep rise, 



150 A Golrlcn Way. 

meeting donkey carts loaded with stran_fTc family 
(groups and driv(Mi with as much recklessness as a 
donkey can be forced to; gi[)sies with their jjictur- 
esquc odds-and-ends costumes and carls, and bath- 
chairs led by man, woman, or boy on foot, in charge 
of some bundlcd-up and invalided passenger. The 
road lay along a magnificent cliff. Thc-n it slii)pcd 
down towards a harbor, made a sudden turn, antl we 
were in Ilfracombe, T^'fty donkej's, all saddled, all 
bridled, all fit for a ride, were drawn up in line along 
the street, each with a driver who strove to look 
more sad and more wistful, and to talk more volubly, 
than any other. 

Ilfracombe is a watering-place, a resting-place, a 
safe harbor for ships or men, and the (juiet Sunday 
that we si)ent there is a memory of the sands of the 
beach with hundreds of children at innocent play, of 
the Capstone — that great rocky cliff, with a magnif- 
icent walk built- into its side,— of many a newly- 
plightcd man and wife in the devotion of the honey- 
moon, for Ilfracombe is the haunt of the " Pilgrim of 
Love," of a band of Welsh minstrels, who sang 
sweetly in thcopcMi air, of the fervor of a branch of the 
Salvation Army, who, morning and noon and night, 
wrestled noisily wMth the Prince of KvW, on 
the strand,- and of a feeling of complete rcstful- 
ncss. 

It is a little rough — the steanuM- ride from ilfra- 
combe 1o Clovelly. Winds lie in lurk around the 
high promontories, and sweej) forth t<^ jilay with 



The Devon Land : Envoy. 151 

the boat and excite the anxiety of those whose stom- 
achs have tender sensibilities. And when the delect- 
able haven is close at hand, the steamer anchors and 
one must climb over its sides into the tossing dories. 
There are, however, experienced arms to help you, 
and stout frames to row you to the landing. Thence 
you climb by zigzag stairs steeply up to where the 
way of the hamlet begins. This way — for street it 
is not — has been called by Marie Corelli " a careless 
garland of flowers left by chance on the side of a 
hill.'' It is a series of steps, paved with pebbles, 
lying between the two rows of quaint cottages, and 
ending at the foot of a steep hill. If you are going 
towards the hill, the name of the way is " Up-a-long," 
and if you are going towards the harbor, it is " Down- 
a-long." 

Once this way was a stream with a cascade in it 
falling steep down into the sea. Along it the 
fishermen, who found a sheltered cove here, built 
their cottages. Then the waters were turned into 
a new channel, and the brook bed became the way of 
the hamlet. The cottages are spotlessly white. Odd 
little balconies, strange little porches, unusual little 
windows, open from rooms or entrances that are them- 
selves little, odd, stratige, and unusual. The whole 
architecture is reminiscent of the sea. The sitting- 
room is like a ship's cabin, with, possibly, a skylight 
in the ceiling and a port-hole in the wall. The orna- 
ments and curios are such as the sea has furnished. 
The pictures are of the sea, also. Sometimes — or per- 
haps I should say somewhere — in this little ribbon of 



152 A Golden Way. 

houses, there are treasures of old cliinathat straight- 
way make the finder covetous. If it be vahiable, 
however, it is not purchasable. If it be purchasable, 
beware ! — for into this idyllic fishing community the 
acute commercial spirit has entered — the serpent in 
the artist's paradise. 

The crimson fuchsia is trained above the doors, 
the i)urple wistaria climbs above the windows, the 
Virginia creeper trails its green length along the 
liouse-walls. There are creeping plants nestling 
close to the gray rocks and every cranny holds its 
blossoming treasure. The perfume of the honey- 
suckle floats down from balcony and chimney, and 
in little, cool retreats the green ferns show their 
uncloying freshness. 

If we walk the full length of Up-a-longwe come 
at its end to a steeper path that leads upward to a 
church, interesting from its connection with the 
Kingsleys, and to- a drive at the edge of the steep 
hill, shaded with wonderful trees, and giving vistas 
of the sea and of Clovelly framed in the graceful 
curves of their branches, — the idyllic " Hobby 
Drive." 

The sea seems to give strength to its sons and 
gentleness to its daughters. The men who pulled 
our boat ashore — fit successors to that Thomas 
Braund who sailed with Francis Drake around the 
world — had faces full of power. The women who 
brought us our luncheon, and lingered to see if it were 
to our liking, were gentle- voiced and sweet-faced, — 
with that expression of patient submission which falls 




UP-A-LONG, CLOVELLY 



Page 152 



The Devon Land : Envoy. 153 

upon the faces of those by whom separation and 
anxiety and sorrow are accepted as a part of the 
fabric of life. 

The moods of the sea, — its wildness when it is a 
furious monster, beating and roaring, and showing 
a cruel face, its gentleness when it lies quiescent, 
bathed in the most wondrous of colors, opalescent, 
shining gold, pale purple with crimson flashes, — are 
daily spread before their eyes. So gentle, so dyed in 
hues more wonderful than painter's palette ever 
held, as peaceful as the soft sky above it, it held 
our boat and bore it away, when we left Clovelly. 
and leaving her, bade an rcvoir to the Devon region, 
for who turns from such a wonderland without 
saying, " I shall return !" 



The golden way led across the fickle English 
Channel to Dieppe — strange, fascinating Dieppe, 
with its old castle, now a military barrack, surmount- 
ing the high chalk cliffs in which the cave-dwellers 
still dwell. I'^or in the soft sides of these cliffs 
holes sufficiently large for a single room have been 
dug out. The front is closed in, a funnel conducts 
the smoke from the household fire, and these caves 
are " home, sweet home " to aragtail lot of humanity. 
If at eventide one looks away to the sea, he has the 
pleasant vision of the fishing boats going sailing 
along near \.\\q plage or beach, to the fishing grounds, 
the singing of the sailors rolling in sweet cadence 
over the waters. On the morrow the night's catch 



1 54 A Golden Way. 

is laid out in piles in the open market, and an auc- 
tioneer goes from pile to pile, selling the lots. The 
moment that a pile is sold the fish-wives come up 
with flat baskets on their backs and bend over to 
have them loaded. The great fish, weighing many- 
pounds each, are thrown with no gentleness into these 
baskets, and off the women go, their sabots clatter- 
ing on the way. Whatever the condition of the 
rest of the dress, the white caps of these women are 
immaculate. I asked permission of two fish-wives 
who presided over a stall — really, \.\\e gj'aiidcs dauics 
of their class here — to photograph them, and al- 
though the negative was spoiled later, there remains 
in my memory a picture of dignity, as they sat 
stiffly up, surpassing that of the ladies of the 
court. 

As we ate our breakfast by the window facing the 
street, each morning there came to our ears a sweet 
and simple little flute-song, and then along the road 
would come five or six goats, and behind them the 
lad who drove them. His long blue blouse reached 
to his ankles, his Normandy cap was pulled well 
over his eyes, and the reed at his lips sang ever the 
same notes, as he drove his flock from door to door, 
selling the milk that he drew from his flock on de- 
mand. 

And so on to Paris — Paris so clean and beautiful 
and fresh, where the streets are as clean as kitchens, 
and people dance in them by night, while by day 
they sip drink at little sidewalk tables ; v/here art 




DOWN-A-LONG, CLOVELLY 



Page 154 



The Devon Land : Envoy. 155 

lifts its head to the skies and vice opens its ways 
to the lowest infernos. But Paris is a mirror. It 
responds to what you will, and that which a man sees 
in Paris is visioned first in his own desires. 

Beyond to Geneva. It was late night when our 
belated train arrived there, but when morning broke 
I had a celestial vision. Across the glorious lake, 
climbing from the earth-mists, its glittering sides 
resplendent beneath the rays of the new-born sun 
like celestial battlements, rose Mont Blanc. Glo- 
rious as I saw it later from Saleve, powerful and 
Titanic as it seemed from the nestling village of 
Chamonix, threatening and awful as when I climbed 
its sides, the first vision, softened by distance, sepa- 
rated by haze from things mundane, lustrous and ro- 
seate beneath the morning sun, is the cherished one. 

At Chamonix Coleridge's " Hymn " sang ever in 
my memory — the most exquisite description of the 
Alps that language can phrase. To see the sun rise 
in the vale of Chamonix, I rose at half-past three 
and looked across the turbid, rushing stream at the 
gloomy sides of the sleeping mountain. Over 
in the meadows a woman was mowing the wet grass, 
but otherwise there was no sign of life. Then 
along the points of the highest line of the mountains 
shot a single ray of light. It grew ; it flushed each 
crest, and hung roseate banners from the highest 
peaks. It stole through unseen valleys, and laid its 
crimson track along their snowy ways. Then, 



156 A Golden Way. 

where it had first gleamed, it threw its fulness of 
glory, crowning the head of the monarch, man- 
tling its sides, and proclaiming to the valleys below, 
still clothed in the shadow of the night, the ever 
old and ever new miracle of the advent of a new 
day. 

From Chamonix across the heights of the Tete- 
Noir, and then winding back and forth down the 
steep ways to Martigny, went our road, and along 
this road the majesty of a mountain storm awed 
and thrilled us. In the night before the thunder had 
rolled, and the lightning had filled the valley of Cha- 
monix, but the morning sped fair and the midday 
was serene. But as we wound down the mountain 
ways over roads where no haste was possible, — 
before us a valley, mountain-walled and stretching 
for miles and miles, — above the farthest horizon we 
saw the clouds gathering. They rose like the black- 
ness of war, and from their increasing gloom there 
sounded the thunder and hurtled the lightning of 
Heaven's artillery. Huge masses of blackness 
rushed before the greater mass behind like the charge 
of black cavalry leading a blacker host beyond. The 
whole scene took the gloom of fear. Then from the 
massed and advancing clouds fell torrents that like 
a moving wall shut more and more of the valley from 
our view. So far was the distance that we watched 
the storm long before it fell on us. Then it envel- 
oped us. It fell in sheets, driving its liquid bullets 
through all our rain guards, running in cascades 



m^. 






'^^^JJg- 




rnE nOBBY DRIVE. (See page 152) Page 156 



The Devon Land : Envoy. 157 

from every little eminence that our bodies formed, 
— the rumble and gleam never ceasing. 

All of a sudden it had passed. The sun shone on 
a valley washed and drenched. It turned every tree 
into something hung with glittering diamonds. Its 
gleam was reflected in myriad cascades and new-born 
brooks, and from rushing torrents that were but 
threads of water awhile before. Adown the valley 
we saw a torrent riding above a torrent, sweeping 
masses of driftwood, parts of some bridge, the debris 
of a dam. People rushed to watch the impetuous, 
swelling flood, and to wonder what had happened 
and what might happen. Somewhere along the 
course two lives had been lost. The story was told 
on the morrow — and forgotten on the next day, so 
closely does life press us on, so speedily does disaster 
sink from sight beneath its flood. 



The golden zvay touched Lausanne. It gave us at 
Berne glimpses of little girls of six or seven knitting 
soberly in the public squares, and old women sawing 
wood in the streets. At Interlaken the long line of 
hotels turn their faces to the majestic Jungfrau. 
She rises, pyramidal in shape, a mass of glittering 
white when the daylight falls upon her, her base hid 
by some nearer verdant mountains whose somber- 
ness heightens the dazzling whiteness of her symmet- 
rical form. Then when the twilight falls gray over 
all else in the scene and the crouching mountains at 
the base have turned black, over her there steals the 



15S A Golden Way. 

faintest tint of pink. It deepens, becomes roseate 
as if the day-god, entering some unseen gate, had al- 
lowed to stream forth a light that never was on sea 
or land. The vision fades, the Alpen-glow has passed, 
the gray shroud of night hides all. 

A short detour from Interlaken brought us to 
Lauterbrunnen, and then straight and steep up to 
Murren. The little hamlet of Murren, built on a 
shelf high up the mountain, perching, like a bird in 
the eaves, far above the tremendous valley, looks 
upon the eternal snows of the Eiger, the Monch, the 
Silberhorn, and the Jungfrau. Across the separating 
ravine there is the booming of avalanches and the 
puffs of snow that mark their fall. In a walk I 
followed a mere sheep track, high and higher up the 
mountain, past the last shelter-houses, my only neigh- 
bor a brook that came tumbling from still greater 
heights. And far, far up, close below the snow line, 
I found an alpine garden. The lilies were so thick 
therein that my feet could not but crush them, and 
their sweetness so lavishly spread that it perfumed 
the air for rods. And here, too, the forget-me-nots 
lifted their heavenly faces, the large pansies showed 
their abundant purple and gold, great anemones 
dwelt in close companionship, and huge ranuncu- 
luses held up their yellow cups. How strange it is 
that at such a height, so close to the chill of the 
summer snows, in such a secreted and lonely spot. 
Nature in sheer prodigality should have planted a 
garden whose myriad blossoms the eyes of no mortal 
should behold save by happy fortune, and whose 




FUNICULAR RAILWAY. <Seepagel34i Page 158 



The Devon Land : Envoy. 159 

odors should give gladness only to the nostrils of the 
chance-led traveler. 

From Interlaken to Lucerne, andthence to Zurich 
lay the pleasant way, — and here I saw a little drama 
that touched me deeply. The silks of Zurich are a 
delight in color and texture, and a marvel in cheap- 
ness. The shop windows are heaped with them, and 
they attract by their brightness the attention of even 
the sober-coated sex. I saw an old German, stolid 
and dreamy, seated on the outside ledge of such a 
window, smoking his pipe. A tap on the window 
from within called his attention and attracted mine. 
A woman was holding up for his inspection a piece 
of bright silk. Her face was faded and seamed. 
The hands were brown and hard. The silk with its 
rose-color and soft texture belonged to youth and 
freshness, to sweet sixteen but the old face was all 
aglow with desire. " Yah," said her phlegmatic 
husband. She pointed to the silk and then to her- 
self, asking in dumb show if she should buy it for 
herself. " Yah, yah," again responded the man, and 
into her face there rolled such a wave of joy as 
brought a smile to the lips of her husband, and made 
my own heart bound in sheer sympathy. It was 
nothing, perhaps ; not worth the telling, one may 
say ; a mere gleam of Indian summer. But can you 
not frame a touching story in it ? And is there any. 
thing so universal as the desire, often pathetic in its 
attempts, to be beautiful or possess beauty ? Or is 
there aught more touching than the love-light that 



i6o A Golden Way. 

glows from faded eyes and irradiates seamed and 
withered faces, — the sweet and softening Alpen- 
glow of human Hfe ? 

From Zurich to ScliaufThausen, to Mayence, to 
Cologne by the castled Rhine, to Brussels, to The 
Hague, Amsterdam, Broek, Monnickendam, and 
Marken, then to Ostend, and once more over the 
English Channel. Across England, a brief run to 
the Isle of Man, and then by steamer back over the 
wide, wide sea. 

And when we came back to Boston Light, on as 
fair a day as that on which our outward voyage car- 
ried us past it, Peace was receiving her tributes. 
The great warships, unscarred by the contests that 
had shattered their adversaries, were steaming proud- 
ly towards the harbor to receive the acclamations of 
the multitudes that lined all the ways. Against 
the soft blue of the sky there fluttered from 
a thousand staffs the dear old home flag. In 
thousands of faces there shone the radiance of wel- 
come and delight. And so with this reflected glory 
shining upon it, the golden loay led us whither it 
had started. 

And were there no shadows on the golden 7vay ? 
Was the path never roughly paved? And was there 
never a crumpled rose-leaf in the beds wherein we 
stretched ? Forsooth, none that I remember now. 
For have I not said that it lingers with me like a 
path of dreams that led ever through such lands as 
Avillon is — 



The Devon Land : Envoy. i6i 

" Where fails not hail, or rain, or any snow. 
Nor ever zvind blows loudly; but it lies 
Deep-meadozved, happy, fair zvith orehard-lawns 
Andbozvery holloi-vs crowned with summer seas. 




4 



'6 



^ 



